By Sami Zaptia.
Tripoli, 16 July 2013:
At Sunday’s press conference, Prime Minister Ali Zeidan said that the decision to reverse his government’s earlier . . .[restrict]decree to create a National Guard was as a result of the undue controversy that it attracted.
As reported by Libya Herald on July 11th, the Zeidan government had repealed its resolution 362 to set up a National Guard.
Government resolution 362 was only announced over a month ago and was intended to support the Libyan army to protect the country from any foreign aggressors. It was to have had a secondary role helping the police maintain internal stability and security.
Zeidan explained that many nations have a national guard, citing Tunisia, Italy and France as examples. He explained that the National Guard would usually be tasked with guarding strategic sites outside cities and urban centres.
He further explained that armies are usually confined to barracks training and preparing for the defence of a nation if needed. They would not be normally involved in the routine guarding of installations and sites.
The Prime Minister was also at pains to clarify that the idea of a Libyan National Guard had started prior to him taking office. He said that the National Guard was not to have any ideological, religious or philosophical leanings. Members of the National Guards would have enrolled individually and would not have been allowed to participate in politics.
Anyway, Zeidan said that too much was made of the formation of this body and he had, therefore, decided to withdraw the idea.
He added that the government was now busy with GNC Laws No (27) and (53) concerned with disbanding armed groups and forcing them out of Tripoli, and busy with the rebuilding of the army and the police. [/restrict]
