By Libya Herald staff.
Tripoli, 24 February 2015:
Reports by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch that Egypt’s air strikes in . . .[restrict]Derna last week killed seven civilians are “nonsense” and based on “false information”, declared Egypt’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Badr Abdel-Atti, denying that any civilians were killed.
Abdel-Atti, speaking to Egyptian media, repeated Egyptian government claims that Egypt had used precision targeting based on carefully-gathered information. The aircraft were, he said, targeting training camps and military facilities. He added that the strikes were carried out in coordination with Libya’s government.
Similar to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has also claimed that they have eye-witness accounts of the air strikes hitting homes and killing civilians. HRW has called for an investigation and also warned that indiscriminate attacks could be classified as war crimes.
Abdel-Atti accused Amnesty and HRW of being “selective” in their condemnation of civilian deaths, claiming that various “super powers” carry out air strikes that result in civilian deaths in the Arab world with no condemnation from the human rights groups. Amnesty, however, has frequently spoken out about indiscriminate western air strikes and particularly about the use of drones. [/restrict]
