Libya

Mary Fitzgerald and Umar Khan report: While heads are rolling in Washington over a damning independent report that found the U.S. State Department’s security planning to be “grossly inadequate,” tensions in Libya’s second largest city continue to rise. On Sunday, gunmen fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a police compound in the city, killing one officer [...]

The Washington Post reports: The CIA rushed security operatives to an American diplomatic compound in Libya within 25 minutes of its coming under attack and played a more central role in the effort to fend off a night-long siege than has been acknowledged publicly, U.S. intelligence officials said Thursday. The agency mobilized the evacuation effort, [...]

The Libya Herald reports: Forces from the national army together with allied brigades have taken control of Bani Walid, the last pro-Qaddafi stronghold in Libya. The announcement was made today by Chief of Staff General Yusuf Mangoush, following reports that the army and allied brigades had succeeded in entering and holding the centre of the [...]

The Libya Herald reports: Displaced refugees from Bani Walid have said that the military now controls the populated districts surrounding the town and are making frequent raids into the centre, using both light and heavy weapons. The assertion comes amidst an ongoing exodus of civilians fleeing the fighting, with tens of thousands now believed to [...]

The New York Times reports: Libyan authorities have singled out Ahmed Abu Khattala, a leader of the Benghazi-based Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia, as a commander in the attack that killed the American ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, last month, Libyans involved in the investigation said on Wednesday. Witnesses at the scene of the attack [...]

The Los Angeles Times reports: Face down on a roof inside the besieged American diplomatic compound, gunfire and flames crackling around them, the two young Libyan guards watched as several bearded men crept toward the ambassador’s residence with semiautomatic weapons and grenades strapped to their chests. “We are finished,” one of the guards says he [...]

Jason Pack and Haley Cook write: Libya’s experiment in democracy has taken another unexpected turn. On the surface, the elections to the General National Congress (GNC) last July produced a surprising victory for the “liberal” National Forces Alliance (NFA) and a fairly resounding defeat for the Muslim Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction party. But when those [...]

The Telegraph reports: Libya’s parliament ousted the country’s new prime minister in a no-confidence vote on Sunday, the latest blow to hopes that the country’s factions could agree on a government charged with restoring stability after last year’s civil war. Mustafa Abushagur was Libya’s first elected prime minister after last year’s overthrow of dictator Moammar [...]

Colum Lynch reports: Libya’s president Mohammed Magarief today contradicted American claims that the deadly attack on the U.S. consulate was a spontaneous reaction to an anti-Islamic film, telling NBC’s Anne Curry in an interview broadcast this morning. “It has nothing to do with this attack,” said Magarief, noting that the assailants used rocket propelled grenades [...]

The Guardian reports: The Libyan authorities have given armed groups two days to vacate military bases and compounds as they seek to capitalise on the wave of people power that drove an Islamist militia from Benghazi at the weekend. Jihadist militias in Derna, Libya’s Islamist stronghold, threw in the towel on Sunday, withdrawing from their [...]

The Guardian reports: The Libyan city of Benghazi was tense after the bodies of six militiamen apparently executed after the storming of a base on the southern outskirts were discovered in a field. The bodies were found the day after crowds marched on three militia bases, including that of Ansar al-Sharia, blamed by many in [...]