Abrar Hussain: At least 400 prisoners have escaped from a jail in Libya’s capital on Sunday during the fighting that broke out between rival armed groups, according to a judiciary official yesterday as the United Nations called for the warring parties to reconcile.
The inmates forced open the doors of the Ain Zara prison, located in southern Tripoli, and guards were unable to stop them, the official said, confirming a judiciary police statement posted on social media. He asked not to get identified and could not provide more details.
Fierce clashes erupted last week between the Seventh Brigade, or Kaniyat, from Tarhouna, a town 65 km (40 miles) southeast of Tripoli, against the Tripoli Revolutionaries’ Brigades (TRB) and the Nawasi, two of the capital’s largest armed groups.
The UN-backed government based in Tripoli declared a state of emergency in the capital “given the seriousness of the current situation.” Although the government is formally in charge, it does not control the capital where armed groups are allied to it but operate with autonomy, often motivated by money and power.
To end the fighting the UN mission in Libya has called on the “various concerned parties” to meet for an “urgent dialogue on the security situation.”
-Source: Reuters