By Noora Ibrahim and Moutaz Ahmed.
Benghazi, 17 June 2014:
The bodies of five men all killed in Benghazi have arrived . . .[restrict]at the city’s medical centre since yesterday.
Spokesman for Benghazi Medical Centre (BMC) Khalil Guider told the Libya Herald that the body of Zaid Amad Shamsa had been brought to the hospital this morning. He said the man had been found dead in Benghazi’s Boudzera district.
A resident in the city’s Al-Berka area said he had seen Shamsa kidnapped by a group of men who arrived in two cars. He added that Shamsa had been shot in the thigh when he attempted to resist his assailants. It is believed that at the time of his kidnapping he was travelling to offer condolences to friends who were grieving the death of their son.
Guider said the body of an Egyptian national had arrived at BMC yesterday. Identifying the man as Khalifa Sayed Hamed, he said Hamed had died of a gunshot wound and was in his mid-thirties.
Meanwhile, Benghazi was this evening preparing for its second night of a traffic curfew, when the only way for people to get around between midnight and 6am is on foot.
Last night’s ban appears to have been widely respected, though in the past week night-time traffic has diminished with travellers wary of being caught up in fighting between Operation Dignity forces and Ansar Sharia.
The traffic curfew has been imposed by the Benghazi Joint Security Room. Its men could be seen last night moving around the city centre after midnight. A road block at Al Kish near the Tripoli Bridge came under attack at around 1am, by unknown assailants. The heavy gunfire that was heard for several minutes resulted in serious injury to a Security Room soldier, who later died in hospital.
Areas of Benghazi endured power cuts in the course of the day but until this evening, when gunfire was heard near the city centre, the level of violence appeared to have diminished. It remains unclear whether Ansar Sharia forces are still resisting the attack on their base at Sidi Faraj, which began on Sunday.
In an unusual development, air force planes yesterday bombed an airstrip at Teka, some 20 kilometres west of Benghazi. Operation Dignity spokesman Mohammed Hejazi told this paper that the action had been taken to stop Islamist forces from trying to fly in weapons and ammunition.
With additional reporting from Ayman Amzein [/restrict]
