By Ajnadin Mustafa.
Tripoli, 14 August 2015:
Early this evening Islamic State (IS) positions in Sirte reportedly suffered a series of airstrikes over a . . .[restrict]30-minute period, in an operation which is not characteristic of the Libyan Air Force.
The targets appear to have included the town’s internal security complex, the Ouagadougou Conference centre (already seriously damaged), part of the university campus and the Mahari hotel, some six kilometres to the west of the town. It is said that the missiles or bombs were fired or dropped from high altitudes and inflicted significant damage.
No figures are yet being given for the casualties from these raids. Palls of smoke were seen to be rising in at least two different locations.
The security complex which IS had been using as their headquarters was hit in June in an air raid claimed by Libya Dawn. Some sixteen people were killed in that attack and many injured. The town’s Ibn Sina hospital was cleared of existing patients so that the wounded could be treated.
The Ibn Sina hospital has itself been caught up in the fighting in the town between IS and locals, which has been raging for three days.
This evening it was reported that at least 85 families had fled to Bani Walid where the municipality was seeking to accommodate them.
It is also being claimed that the twelve decapitated corpses found together today were of carers and the wounded people they had been treating in a make-shift hospital. IS fighters allegedly seized and executed them.
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