OMAN TRIBUNE
BENGHAZI/TRIPOLI Leaders of an autonomy movement in Libya’s oil-rich East unilaterally declared a regional government on Sunday, in a challenge to the weak the federal government as new violence erupted in the restive region.
The announcement is a symbolic blow to efforts by the Tripoli government to reopen eastern oil ports and fields blocked since summer by militias and tribes demanding a greater share of power and oil wealth.
It has no practical implications but is sure to worsen ties between the east and Tripoli which has rejected the self-rule notion. Officials were not immediately available for comment.
Lawlessness has blighted large areas of the Opec producer since the 2011 war that toppled Muammar Gaddafi. The government has been unable to rein in militia groups, armed tribes and radical Islamists.
This is especially true for Eastern Libya, known as Cyrenaica, where tribes, activists and militias have been pushing for a federal system sharing power with the west and southern Fezzan.
Leaders of the movement met in the small town of Ajdabiya, close to the oil port of Brega, to launch an autonomous government, supporters said. They named themselves the Barqa, or Cyrenaica, government.
A pro-federalist television station showed more than 20 ministers taking the oath at a podium decorated with a Cyrenaica flag.
They were joined by tribal militia leader Ibrahim Jathran, former head of Libya’s Petroleum Protection Force in charge of guarding oil facilities. He defected in the summer and seized the biggest ports Ras Lanuf and Es-Sider with his troops.
Once a rebel combatting Gaddafi troops, he wore a business suit and a tie during the ceremony standing next to the self-declared Prime Minister Abd-Rabbo Al Barassi, a defected air force commander. Tribal leaders joined the ceremony.
Prime Minister Ali Zeidan had been seeking contact with the east in the past few days trying to reopen blocked oil ports in an area home to 60 per cent of the country’s oil production.
Zeidan said last week the blocked Hariga port in the far east would reopen on Sunday or Monday but an oil source said talks between the government and local officials to resume exports were continuing.
Jathran and many others in the east accuse Prime Minister Ali Zeidan as well as Islamists in the General National Congress of corruption and failing to provide security since Gaddafi’s downfall.
In separate violence, an intelligence officer and his daughter, aged around two, were killed by a bomb while he was driving inside the city, said Abdullah Al Zaidy, a spokesman for Benghazi’s security forces. His wife and another child were wounded, he said. More than 80 people protested in the evening in the city centre against the killing, denouncing government and parliament for failing to provide security, activists said.
BENGHAZI/TRIPOLI Leaders of an autonomy movement in Libya’s oil-rich East unilaterally declared a regional government on Sunday, in a challenge to the weak the federal government as new violence erupted in the restive region.
The announcement is a symbolic blow to efforts by the Tripoli government to reopen eastern oil ports and fields blocked since summer by militias and tribes demanding a greater share of power and oil wealth.
It has no practical implications but is sure to worsen ties between the east and Tripoli which has rejected the self-rule notion. Officials were not immediately available for comment.
Lawlessness has blighted large areas of the Opec producer since the 2011 war that toppled Muammar Gaddafi. The government has been unable to rein in militia groups, armed tribes and radical Islamists.
This is especially true for Eastern Libya, known as Cyrenaica, where tribes, activists and militias have been pushing for a federal system sharing power with the west and southern Fezzan.
Leaders of the movement met in the small town of Ajdabiya, close to the oil port of Brega, to launch an autonomous government, supporters said. They named themselves the Barqa, or Cyrenaica, government.
A pro-federalist television station showed more than 20 ministers taking the oath at a podium decorated with a Cyrenaica flag.
They were joined by tribal militia leader Ibrahim Jathran, former head of Libya’s Petroleum Protection Force in charge of guarding oil facilities. He defected in the summer and seized the biggest ports Ras Lanuf and Es-Sider with his troops.
Once a rebel combatting Gaddafi troops, he wore a business suit and a tie during the ceremony standing next to the self-declared Prime Minister Abd-Rabbo Al Barassi, a defected air force commander. Tribal leaders joined the ceremony.
Prime Minister Ali Zeidan had been seeking contact with the east in the past few days trying to reopen blocked oil ports in an area home to 60 per cent of the country’s oil production.
Zeidan said last week the blocked Hariga port in the far east would reopen on Sunday or Monday but an oil source said talks between the government and local officials to resume exports were continuing.
Jathran and many others in the east accuse Prime Minister Ali Zeidan as well as Islamists in the General National Congress of corruption and failing to provide security since Gaddafi’s downfall.
In separate violence, an intelligence officer and his daughter, aged around two, were killed by a bomb while he was driving inside the city, said Abdullah Al Zaidy, a spokesman for Benghazi’s security forces. His wife and another child were wounded, he said. More than 80 people protested in the evening in the city centre against the killing, denouncing government and parliament for failing to provide security, activists said.
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