By Sami Zaptia.
Tripoli, 17 August 2014:
Libya’s Attorney . . .[restrict]General, Ibrahim Bashia, issued a decision yesterday to investigate crimes committed against civilians as a result of the fighting taking place in Tripoli between warring militias.
Sideeg Al-Sour, the head of the Investigations Department at the Attorney General’s Office told Libyan media yesterday that these investigations would be carried out into war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes that curtail liberty.
Al-Sour also added that the Attorney General’s Office has also established a complaints box which has received reports from citizens affected by crimes or moral or material losses as a result of the armed clashes in Tripoli.
It will be recalled that opposing militias, have been engaged in clashes in the city of Tripoli since 13 July. Although all the militias engaged in the urban fighting are recognized and sponsored by the state, the Libyan state, in the form of the government and the newly elected parliament (the House of Representatives) has not sanctioned the fighting.
In fact, together with the leading international community in the form of the UN, EU and the Arab League, the Libyan state has persistently called for an immediate ceasefire.
Nevertheless, fighting has continued in urban Tripoli with indiscriminate shelling falling on residential areas causing collateral damage as well as leading tens of thousands of civilians to flee their homes in the conflict zones.
The fighting has also caused the destruction of almost all of Libya’s fleet of passenger planes, major damage to Tripoli’s International Airport as well as the destruction of Tripoli’s main Fuel Depot.
The nascent and weak post 2011 revolution Libyan state has proven itself powerless with little leverage at its disposal to enable it to force the clashing militias into a ceasefire. It has therefore turned to the threat of both domestic and international criminal litigation in the hope of frightening the opposing sides into ending hostilities.
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