By Sami Zaptia.
London, 1 October 2019:
UNSMIL condemned yesterday the armed threat on the Tripoli Finance Ministry.
It said that it ‘‘condemns the threats directed against the Ministry of Finance by members of an armed group on 25 September.
This deplorable act constitutes a serious blow to the rule of law. The Mission expresses its full support to the competent authorities’ decision to identify and prosecute the perpetrators and stands ready to provide all necessary support to state institutions and officials in their quest to serve the Libyan people through the full implementation of rule of law’’.
It will be recalled that a person purporting to be the Deputy head of Libya’s Intelligence Service entered the Finance Ministry on Sikka Road in Tripoli (not far from the Office of the Prime Minister) last Wednesday and threatened staff.
The driver of this threatening behaviour it was reported was that the Finance Ministry had stopped the salaries of the Intelligence Service.
It was reported that he refused to leave the building which resulted in all the Finance Ministry staff leaving the building.
A leaked letter from the Finance Ministry addressed to the Public Prosecutor’s Office and Interior Ministry requested that the incident is investigated and the accused be prosecuted.