By Libya Herald reporters.
Tripoli, 30 May 2017:
Armed force commander-in-chief Khalifa Hafter has praised the Presidency Council for its weekend fight against pro-General National Congress militias in Tripoli and claimed at Qatar ispaying large sums to foreign mercenaries to go and fight with these groups.
“The Libyan army has recorded the arrival in Libya of citizens from Chad, Sudan and other African and Arab states” he said. “They got in to Libya because of the lack of border controls. They received money from Qatar, as well as other countries and terrorist groups.”
In a statement issued in Cairo yesterday Hafter did not spell out who the “other countries” might be. But he warned “Any foreigner carrying arms in Libya will be arrested and punished collectively or individually.”
Hafter also said that forces in the west of Libya that were loyal to the Libyan National Army (LNA) should get ready to move into Tripoli to free the capital from “Islamist political parties.”
Hafter praised forces backing the Presidency Council (PC) which had fought against the pro-General National Congress (GNC) attackers over the weekend. He also called for cooperation with the PC and said a state of emergency should be declared and all troops be mobilised to end the presence in the the militias that were endangering the lives of citizens.
Last December Hafter was also calling for pro-LNA locals to ready themselves to “liberate” Tripoli.
Again in March when a rally of his supporters was fired on in the capital, Hafter vowed to attack the militias responsible if they did not lay down their arms.
