Security - Libya sets up special task force to rid Tripoli of armed militias - Determined to rid Tripoli, the Libyan capital, of armed militias, the Libyan government has established a special task force saddled with the responsibility to rid various farms on the outskirts of Tripoli of occupants suspected to be 'criminals', the official spokesman of the Ministry of Interior, Al-Moujdi Irki, announced here Sunday.
He said the force would restore the farms to their owners immediately after the operation.
However, Hud Ali Kassem, a spokesman of the former rebels in Tripoli, said his comrades would resist any security plan likely to drive them away from the city.
In a press statement, Kassem said it was illegal to form the special force without enlisting the rebels, whom he said fought in the battlefield to free Libya.
The Libyan Prime Minister, Ali Zeidan, told a press conference last week that the task force would secure all sites occupied by armed militias acting outside the law across the country.
He said the government would not recognize armed groups outside the authority of the State Police and Army, and called on armed militias who do not comply with the state authority to surrender their weapons to the Ministry of the Interior and abide by the country’s laws.
These developments came some days after armed militias attacked the headquarters of the General National Congress, Libya’s highest law-making authority, and attempted to assassinate the President of Congress, Mohamed Al-Mégrayef.
The attackers also sacked the parliamentarians from their seat.
According to Al-Mégrayef, the parliamentarians will relocate to a safer place to resume their sitting.
Members of the civil society organizations and other Libyans Wednesday demonstrated at the Martyrs Square to demand the dissolution of the militias.
Nouri Al-Ali Daroufki, member of the civil society organizations coordinating committee, stated that militias have until 25 March to surrender their weapons after which an operation to free the occupied farms will be launched.
Pana 12/03/2013