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By Hadi Fornaji.
Tripoli, 31 August 2103:
Tunisia is stepping up security along its 460-kilometre border with Libya, from Ras Jedir to Ghadames . . .[restrict]in a bid to deter smugglers and terrorists. Following a meeting with meeting on Thursday his country’s Minister of Defence, Rachid Sabbagh, as well as the army chief, General Mohamed Salah Hamdi, and the Inspector General for the Armed Forces, Brigadier-General Mohamed Nafti,Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki yesterday issued a presidential degree making the border area a restricted zone. The decree also covers the area adjacent to the border with Algeria.
Tunisis has been struggling with cross-border smuggling as well as an armed insurrection by Al-Qaeda militants in the Chaambi mountains on the Algerian border. Arms from Libya are said to have been supplied to the insurgents. Militants from Libya are also reported to have joined them. Meanwhile, the explosion of cross border smuggling from and to Libya since the two countries’ revolutions has also had disasterous consequences for security in the south west of the country with smugglers openly defying the law.
According to the Tunisian state news agency TAP, the security zone will stay in place for a year and could remain so indefinitely if needed. Anyone wanting to access the zone will need a permit. Those doing so without such permit would be pursued.
Details of the permit have not yet been disclosed so it is not yet possible to say how the move will affect border traffic. However, the decision is thought likely to put on hold for some considerable time plans to open a third border crossing.
The Tunisian Foreign Minister Othman Jarandi is thought to have discussed the move with Prime Minister Ali Zeidan when he visited Tripoli last week. [/restrict]
