By Libya Herald Reporters.
Tripoli, 20 February 2015:
There are mixed messages coming out of Libya Dawn. Yesterday an anonymous spokesman for the . . .[restrict]antigovernment of Omer Al-Hassi refuted media reports in “Pro-Dignity Operation media” saying Egyptians had been given 48 hours to leave Dawn-controlled territory “for their own safety”.
He promised an official statement to deny the claim. Today, the Pro-Dawn Libya Observer carried news of virtually the same warning from the antigovernment itself. It said that Hassi had urged Egyptian workers to leave Libya for their safety. Hassi accused Qaddafi henchmen of attacking them “to undermine security and create chaos here”.
Some Dawn sources continue to deny the authenticity of the IS-published beheading video of the 20 Egyptian Copts and, it is believed, one Ghanaian Christian, on a beach near Sirte. This, despite the strong condemnation of the crime which was broadcast on Monday by Nuri Abu Sahmain, the president of the rump GNC. Sahmain urged Libyans to exercise restraint and not to harm Egyptian workers in retaliation for Cairo’s airstrikes on Derna.
Today, the pro-Dawn version of the news agency LANA carried a report quoting the Libyan Department of Border Management, to the effect that the beheaded Egyptians had not been registered in its records. It seems the department did not make clear how it thought their apparently illegal status might have contributed to the Egyptians’ gruesome fate. [/restrict]
