Starting last April President Trump caught many in his own administration off guard when he unexpectedly thanked renegade General Khalifa Haftar for "securing Libya's oil resources" at a moment the rebel leader assaulted the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli.

The public praise and phone call between Trump and the former CIA-backed warlord was a shock at the time given the US has maintained a policy of only recognizing the GNA in line with UN allies.

But now that continued recognition appears to be shifting fast after this week Trump admin officials held multiple meetings with an official representing Haftar's political team named Aref al-Nayed, expected to hold a top leadership position once Tripoli is 'liberated' by Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA).

The United States has called on Libyan renegade General Khalifa Haftar to stop a months-long offensive on Tripoli and said it would back the country’s internationally recognised government against "Russia’s attempts to exploit the conflict".

The statement was the most explicit call by Washington against the self-styled Libyan National Army of Haftar, who was earlier praised by President Donald Trump.

"The United States calls on the 'Libyan National Army’ to end its offensive on Tripoli," the US State Department said in a joint statement released on Thursday after talks with a delegation from Libya’s Tripoli-based Government of National Accord in Washington.

Libya has been split between rival camps based in Tripoli and the east since 2014, a result of the divisions that surfaced following the NATO-backed overthrow of long-time ruler Muammar Gaddafi three years earlier.

In what marks a major shift in US policy in Libya, the US State Department issued a statement late Thursday demanding that Gen. Khalifa Hafter and his self-proclaimed Libyan National Army (LNA) stop trying to conquer the capital city of Tripoli.

The US had initially opposed the LNA invasion of Tripoli in April, but following a talking-to from Saudi Arabia and other nations seen as pro-Hafter, President Trump endorsed Hafter and suggested he’s going to play a big role in Libya in the future. This remained the US position up until now.

The change seems to be a function of recent news about Russia backing Hafter, with the State Department accusing Russia of “exploiting the conflict against the will of the Libyan people.”

A former general in the Gadhafi-era military, Hafter later was a CIA asset and participated in several failed coups d’etat. His force has substantial territory in eastern Libya, but has struggled to move deep into Tripoli.

A new report in Axios suggests that Russia has significantly increased its presence in war-torn Libya, perhaps seeking to clean up the mess left in the wake of the US-NATO led regime change war which toppled Muammar Gaddafi.

This after a recent NY Times investigation found that at least 200 Russian mercenaries from Wagner Group have been in Libya supporting renegade General Khalifa Haftar's offensive against the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli.

Eight years after Gaddafi's overthrow and brutal field execution at the hands of NATO-backed rebel Islamists, the oil and gas abundant country is still in the throes of grinding factional civil war.

Interior Minister for Tripoli's GNA Fathi Bashagha told Axios the unfolding “proxy war” will doom the country to become “a haven for terrorists and extremists” unless the US steps in again.

One of the 3,000 Hillary Clinton emails released by the State Department on New Year’s Eve (where real news is sent to die quietly) has revealed evidence that NATO’s plot to overthrow Gaddafi was fueled by first their desire to quash the gold-backed African currency, and second the Libyan oil reserves.

The email in question was sent to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by her unofficial adviser Sydney Blumenthal titled “France’s client and Qaddafi’s gold”.

US Africa Command issued a statement on Wednesday reporting that airstrikes against the southern Libyan town of Murzuq killed at least 11 people. The US statement declared everyone slain a “suspected militant.”

The US statement said they intended to kill ISIS members, and they believe they did so. This is the second strike against Murzuq in the past week by the US, with everyone slain as yet an unnamed “suspect.”

The UN expressed concern about the strikes, warning that “the conflict risks escalating to a full-blown civil war,” and faulting “external actors” for their involvement in the clashes.

Recently made public FBI records reveal that the agency virtually ignored evidence from private GOP-backed sources about a scheme in which Hillary Clinton associates tried to exploit her position as Secretary of State in order to profit from the 2011 turmoil in Libya she helped to create, according to RealClearInvestigations.

The documents, provided to the FBI in June 2016 as the agency was kicking its Trump-Russia investigation into high gear, allege that Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal sent her "a series of detailed memos and reports about Libya," which were intended as a "quid pro quo" which might help a post-Gaddafi Libya recover as much as $66 billion in offshore funds hidden by the slain strongman.

Libyan military commander Khalifa Haftar will press on with his five-month offensive to capture Tripoli despite mounting international calls for a cease-fire and talks, according to his spokesman.

In an interview in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday, General Ahmed al-Mismari dismissed the internationally-recognized prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, as powerless and negotiations as futile. “The man was unable to sign a single paper,” he said of Sarraj. “He would always give the excuse that he needed to hold consultations. We’ve exhausted all good offices.”

The expanding chaos of the renewed war in Libya, increasingly a 'failed state' if there ever was a prime example of one, now approaching a decade on from its so-called "liberation" in 2011 by US-NATO forces, keeps providing daily and weekly reminders of the Obama-Hillary Clinton legacy of 'humanitarian intervention'.

On Saturday what is being reported as either a car bomb or possibly a roadside bomb ripped through a neighborhood in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi near United Nations offices.

The blast killed two UN staff, identified as United Nations Libya mission (UNSMIL) guards, with an additional ten people wounded, some among them children, according to Reuters.

The airport, the only one still functioning in Tripoli, has already endured airstrikes in the past that forced it to close to all air traffic, but was recently restored at the beginning of July.

Tripoli's Mitiga International Airport has closed for incoming and outgoing air traffic after being hit by air strikes, the airport reported on its Facebook page. No further details have been given so far.

Libya's capital Tripoli, which is controlled by the Government of National Accord (GNA), has been under attack by the forces of Libyan National Army (LNA) commanded by Khalifa Haftar since April. Haftar announced that the LNA would clear the city of GNA forces, which he described as "terrorists".

Libya was once a key embarkation point for jihadists headed to foreign battlefields - first in the 1980s Afghan-Soviet War where they supported the CIA-backed mujahideen, and more recently in Syria, where both massive jihadist manpower and heavy weaponry were transferred to the killing fields of Aleppo and Idlib (also, it should be noted, in support of CIA regime change efforts against Assad).

But as we described after a recent New York Times report unveiled that US anti-tank missiles have been found in "unknown" Libyan rebel hands fighting within warlord Khalifa Haftar's ranks, the once stable formerly Gadaffi-ruled Arab North African country which was in 2011 "liberated" at the hands of US-NATO forces has once again become ground zero in a grinding proxy war which has allowed jihadists to run rampant amid the chaos.

SOURCE: ZEROHEDGE
Libya was once a key embarkation point for jihadists headed to foreign battlefields - first in the 1980s Afghan-Soviet War where they supported the CIA-backed mujahideen, and more recently in Syria, where both massive jihadist manpower and heavy weaponry were transferred to the killing fields of Aleppo and Idlib (also, it should be noted, in support of CIA regime change efforts against Assad).

But as we described after a recent New York Times report unveiled that US anti-tank missiles have been found in "unknown" Libyan rebel hands fighting within warlord Khalifa Haftar's ranks, the once stable formerly Gadaffi-ruled Arab North African country which was in 2011 "liberated" at the hands of US-NATO forces has once again become ground zero in a grinding proxy war which has allowed jihadists to run rampant amid the chaos.

Russian President Vladimir Putin says the US-led NATO military alliance is to blame for the destruction of Libya, warning that the situation there was deteriorating as more and more militants are moving from Syria into the North African country.

Speaking at a joint press conference with Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte in Rome, Putin said it is important to recall how the chaos unfolded in Libya.

“Do you remember who destroyed Libya? It was a NATO decision. It was European aircraft that bombed Libya,” he said.

The North African country has plunged into a civil war since longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi was toppled and killed after an uprising and a NATO military intervention in 2011.

Following the exposure of Belgium's mishandling of Muammar Gaddafi's frozen funds, it turns out that the British government has been collecting taxes on the former head of state's blocked UK assets. British and US lawmakers have discussed the legality of London's move and shared prognoses on whether the money will ever be returned to the Libyans.

Neither the late Muammar Gaddafi nor the citizens of Libya have access to the whopping £12 billion in assets the former head of state had in the UK, but Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs has collected around £17 million in taxes on the assets since 2016, according to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee's latest report.

The disclosure has prompted some British lawmakers to demand that London use the money earned in interest on the frozen accounts to compensate the victims of the Irish Republican Army (IRA); the organisation was supplied with weapons and explosives by the Gaddafi government in the 1980s.

SOURCE: ALJAZEERA.COM

The United Nations Security Council has called on Libya's warring parties to commit to a ceasefire after a deadly air raid on a detention centre for migrants and refugees near the capital, Tripoli.

"The members of the Security Council stressed the need for all parties to urgently de-escalate the situation and to commit to a ceasefire," the 15-member body said in a joint statement on Friday.

"Lasting peace and stability in Libya will come only through a political solution."

The UN's most powerful body also called on the parties to rapidly return to UN-mediated political talks, and urged other countries not to intervene or exacerbate conflict in Libya, which has been wracked by chaos since the NATO-backed overthrow of leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

A U.S. judge declared a mistrial Monday after a federal jury convicted a second Libyan man of conspiracy in the deadly 2012 attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, but deadlocked on 15 of 17 counts in connection with the deaths of U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

U.S. District Judge Christopher "Casey" Cooper found jurors hung and dismissed them after they reported themselves unable "to come to unanimous agreement on any of the remaining counts" in a note sent at 11:27 a.m.

Cooper last Thursday asked jurors to return after a weekend break following their partial verdict, in which they found Mustafa al-Imam, 47, guilty on one count each of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and maliciously destroying government property in overnight attacks that began Sept. 11, 2012, on a U.S. diplomatic mission and nearby CIA post.

CAIRO/TRIPOLI (Reuters) - The head of the Libyan parliament aligned with eastern forces trying to seize the capital from the internationally-backed government said on Thursday there could be no peace talks until they had captured the city.

Forces led by Khalifa Haftar launched an offensive on Tripoli in early April but the assault has stalled in the face of resistance from local armed groups aligned with the U.N.-recognised government there.

Haftar and his backers say they are trying to free the capital from militias which they blame for destabilising Libya since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011.

Haftar’s critics accuse him of trying to seize power through force and deepening a conflict between factions based in the east and west of the sprawling North African country.

The campaign on Tripoli has left at least 653 dead and displaced more than 93,000, according to the United Nations, as well as causing extensive material damage.

We might call it the war for Libya 2.0, given that following the Arab North African country turning to chaos and ruin following the 2011 US-NATO regime change war against Gaddafi, a new war for Tripoli is fast becoming internationalized in what threatens to be a full-blown proxy war.

New reports this week have uncovered what appear to be covert arms shipments pouring into the war-torn country on "mysterious planes" in support of General Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA), which has since early April laid siege to the capital city. At the same time, there's new evidence that external countries like Turkey as well as foreign mercenaries are bolstering the ranks of the UN-backed Government of National Accord which Haftar is trying to unseat.

He noted that the offensive on Tripoli came on the eve of the holding of a national conference in the Libyan city of Ghadames, a key event in Libya's political process.

"To see those who had enthusiastically accepted our invitation to Ghadames suddenly take up arms against each other to attack the capital, or to defend it, has thrown me into the deepest level of sadness for the opportunity lost and for a hope killed exactly 10 days before its realization," said Salame.

The attack on Tripoli also imperiled the potential of the talks held on Feb. 27 in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates, between Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj and Gen. Haftar, the sixth of its kind between them, he said.

Eight years on from NATO’s war in Libya in 2011, as the country enters a new phase in its conflict, I have taken stock of the number of countries to which terrorism has spread as a direct product of that war. The number is at least 14. The legacy of the overthrow of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi — pursued by U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and U.S. President Barack Obama — has been gruesomely felt by Europeans and Africans. Yet holding these leaders accountable for their decision to go to war is as distant as ever.

This is the first proof of foreign mercenaries fighting for the international community’s U.N. backed Tripoli based ‘government’. (As stated earlier, who In actuality, due to there existing no GNA Armed Forces, no real Serraj government forces, are a collection of militias with a dominant influence of the Muslim Brotherhood, an organisation that dates back to the 1920s that is already designated in some countries as a terrorist organisation).

Its worth giving further background to a little discussed aspect of extremist organisations like ISIS, is where in the main do they recruit from? The answer is Tunisia!

NATO is ready to “help Libya” in setting up security structures if conditions are favorable, Alliance Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told a meeting with UN Special Envoy to Libya Gassan Salama.

Stoltenberg held a meeting with Salama on Monday to discuss the situation in Libya, in which NATO helped deteriorate, expressing the Alliance’s deep concern about the situation in Libya and stressed that it will continue to call on all parties to cease hostilities and join to the political process. He made it clear that there is no military solution to the situation in Libya, reported the NATO press office.

In addition, NATO is supposedly ready to help Libya build effective security institutions, including a modern Ministry of Defense and effective security services under civilian control of the government, but it will be done at the request of the Libyan government and only if the security conditions are favorable, he said.

Once-secret e-mails belonging to Democrat Party presidential nominee Hillary Clinton expose the involvement of Obama's then-secretary of state in shipping weapons to jihadists, including to terrorists in the Islamic State, or ISIS, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said last week. Speaking to the far-left Democracy Now program, Assange highlighted the fact that Clinton played a key role in funneling weaponry from Libya, which she helped destroy alongside jihadist allies on the ground, to Obama-backed terror groups in Syria.

The true extent of the fall-out from the Libya war is remarkable: it has spurred terrorism in Europe, Syria, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa

On 4 April, General Khalifa Haftar, whose forces control Eastern Libya, announced the first phase of an offensive intended to gain control of forces loyal to Tripoli, prompting the mobilisation of the defense. In response, armed forces loyal to the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA) launched a military op against the LNA.

According to the Tripoli-based Libyan government, cited by Libya Observer, the country’s Presidential Council has evidence that foreign aircraft were involved in a drone attack on Tripoli that took place on Saturday evening, noting that an investigation is underway in coordination with the United Nations.

Eight international NGOs demanded on Thursday that France suspend delivery of boats to Libya’s coast guard over concerns they would be used to intercept migrants. The groups included Amnesty International and Doctors Without Borders. French Armed Forces Minister Florence Parly had in February agreed to donate six boats to the Libyan Navy, under which the coast guard operates. The move, she said, was aimed at helping them “in the fight against illegal immigration.” However, rights groups say the vessels would be used to block migrant boats attempting to reach Europe, forcing those on board to return to war-torn Libya.

The European Union has formally recognized the government in Tripoli. However, French officials seem to be playing both sides. Many Libyans want France's government to butt out — and General Haftar continues to advance.

The participants at the Forum of Russian-Arab Cooperation agreed to continue developing efforts to contribute to the normalization in Libya, declared the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, Sergey Lavrov, at the closing of negotiations held with the Secretary General of the League of Arab States, Ahmed Aboul Gheit.

“We have agreed to continue working on the normalization of Libya,” said Lavrov.

The Russian foreign minister said that those gathered expressed their support for the efforts of the UN special representative, Ghassan Salame, on the implementation of the Road Map, prepared by him, to contribute to the normalization in Libya.

“The common task of the interested parties is to help the Libyans overcome the existing discord and reach agreements that lead to national reconciliation,” said Lavrov.

Government of National Accord (GNA) aviation is targeting the Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA) positions located not far from Libya's capital, Tripoli, an LNA source told Sputnik.

"The military aviation of the Government of National Accord has hit the LNA Army's points in the Sukh al-Akhad region located in 40 kilometres from Tripoli," the source told Sputnik.

DETAILS TO FOLLOW

During the last 3 days, intense clashes were ongoing between militias loyal to the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) and the Libyan National Army (LNA) south of the capital of Tripoli and in several coastal areas. Pro-GNA factions concentrated most of their best forces and efforts in the area of Tripoli International Airport. By April 10, they had recaptured most of the airport and the town of Swani from the LNA and advanced further to the south entering Al-Aziiziyah. This counter-attack was led by the Tripoli Protection Forces and Misrata militias. According to pro-GNA sources, they have captured 34 LNA service members with their vehicles and destroyed at least one LNA battle tank.

As General Khalifa Haftar’s offensive closes in on the Libyan capital of Tripoli, US troops have withdrawn, leaving the UN-supported Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj on his own. A scholar told Sputnik that Haftar is the man the international community wants, but they only want him so he’ll resume production in Libya’s vast oil fields.

Once the most affluent country in Africa, Libya has been wracked by chaos and civil war since the catastrophic NATO-directed intervention in 2011 that overthrew longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi, resulting in his murder, the destruction of the country and its splitting into rival militant factions.

Haftar's LNA troops began an advance on Tripoli last week, striking positions of armed forces loyal to the GNA at the city's defunct international airport on Tuesday after an attack on another airport a day earlier.

DETAILS TO FOLLOW

Much of the Mainstream Media’s reporting about the latest events in Libya usually always includes at least one line about how Libyan National Army (LNA) General Haftar is allegedly “Russian-backed”, which is meant to turn him into a bogeyman in the minds of the West’s intended infowar audience. Haftar used to be patronized by the US (where he spent years of his life after fleeing Libya following a failed plot to overthrow Gaddafi) until “going rogue” a few years back and behaving much more independently in pursuit of what he genuinely believes to be his homeland’s true national interests.

Libya's internationally recognised government in Tripoli has declared a military alert after eastern forces loyal to renegade General Khalifa Haftar said they had moved towards the western part of the country.

A brief skirmish between Haftar's self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) and forces allied to Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj, the head of the Tripoli-based administration, was reported on Wednesday evening near a town south of the capital.

"Right now they [there] are clashes south of Tripoli ... in Gharyan," LNA spokesman Ahmed Mismari told the UAE-based al-Arabiya channel.

No casualty figures or details were immediately available.

The oil-rich country, which has been in turmoil since the NATO-backed removal of its long-time ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, has at least two rival administrations: one based in Tripoli, and another in the eastern city of Tobruk, which is allied with Haftar.

Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar, a 40-year veteran of Libyan politics and longtime CIA asset, on Thursday ordered his self-styled Libyan National Army (NLA) to advance on the densely populated capital, Tripoli, where the United Nations-backed government is seated.

In the aftermath of the “humanitarian intervention” led by NATO in support of jihadists seeking to oust longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, various factions have vied for power in the war-torn nation, once the wealthiest in Africa. According to the Special Monitoring Mission to Libya, forces loyal to Haftar, a former CIA asset, now control more than 77 percent of the country.

The army behind Libya's UN-backed government has announced a counteroffensive to defend Tripoli, vowing to reclaim all areas seized by forces loyal to renegade General Khalifa Haftar, who have been marching on the outskirts of the capital.

Colonel Mohamed Gnounou told reporters in Tripoli on Sunday that the counteroffensive, dubbed Volcano of Anger, was aimed at "purging all Libyan cities of aggressor and illegitimate forces".

The announcement came as Haftar's forces said they conducted the first air raid on a Tripoli suburb as part of their aim to overthrow the internationally-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) and take control of Tripoli.

There is no military solution to the Libya conflict, US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo stressed

Libya has been in a state of the constant chaos since the NATO intervention in 2011. After the fall of the government of Muammar Gaddafi, the country fell into the hands of warrying armed factions, many of which were linked to radical Islamist groups. Al-Qaeda and then ISIS strengthened and expanded their presence in the country. The erupted humanitarian crisis has never been fully overcome. A high level of violence, crime and unsolved humanitarian issues turned Libya in one of the key hubs of arms, drugs and even trafficking. A large number of the refugees moving to Europe uses Libya as a transfer point.

Forces loyal to rival Libyan army commander Khalifa Hifter said Saturday they seized control of the main airport in Libya's capital Tripoli, two days after Hifter ordered his forces to seize the seat of Libya's U.N.-backed government.

Hifter's media office said in a post online that they took full control of the Tripoli international airport and were working to secure the facility. They posted photos of troops apparently inside the airport, saying "we are standing at the heart of the Tripoli international airport."

Hifter's offensive on Tripoli could plunge the oil-rich country into another spasm of violence, possibly the worst since the 2011 civil war that toppled and later killed longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi. The country is governed by rival authorities: The internationally backed government in Tripoli and the government in the east, which Hifter is aligned with. Each is backed by an array of militias.

The only functioning airport in the Libyan capital of Tripoli has been hit in an air raid, local TV and several agencies report, citing eyewitnesses. Heavy fighting broke out between the forces of the country's two governments.
A military aircraft belonging to the Libyan National Army forces has reportedly targeted Mitiga airport, located in the Libyan capital’s eastern suburb. Commanded by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar the group challenged the government in Tripoli for power.

The Libyan authorities confirmed that the airport was closed following the airstrike, but provided no additional information on casualties or damage resulting from it. Mitiga has been the only airport used for international flights since the capital’s international airport was destroyed back in 2014.

Libya is back in the headlines after one of its two competing governments sent troops towards Tripoli. If another bloodbath happens there, it will be the inevitable result of the 2011 NATO bombing campaign, an expert told RT.
The Northern African country was once stable and quite prosperous thanks to large revenues from oil trade. But since 2011, when NATO supported a militant uprising and helped topple, then kill, longtime strongman leader Muammar Gaddafi, it remains a fractured failed state. Last week, the unending feuds between rival factions escalated, with Khalifa Haftar, a powerful military commander, launching an offensive against his rivals from the UN-recognized government in Tripoli.

The general is unlikely to immediately heed calls for a political settlement, believes US political commentator and historian Gerald Horne. This may escalate into a major battle in the capital.

U.S. military officials say American forces will temporarily leave Libya three days after a renewed flareup of fighting between rival armed groups.

Marine Corps Gen. Thomas Waldhauser, head of U.S. Africa Command, said in a statement Sunday "the security realities on the ground in Libya are growing increasingly complex and unpredictable."

He did not say where U.S. forces will relocate to.

US Africa Command (AFRICOM) commander Thomas D. Waldhauser said that the decision to redeploy US forces was made "due to increased unrest". According to him, the situation in Libya has deteriorated and American troops are no longer safe there.

Libyan media released footage showing the temporary redeployment of the US Africa Command's military personnel.

READ MORE: US Evacuates Personnel From Libya Due To Increased Unrest — Report

US Africa Command (AFRICOM) commander Thomas D. Waldhauser said that the decision to redeploy US forces was made "due to increased unrest". According to him, the situation in Libya has deteriorated and American troops are no longer safe there.

Libyan media released footage showing the temporary redeployment of the US Africa Command's military personnel.

READ MORE: US Evacuates Personnel From Libya Due To Increased Unrest — Report

The Libyan National Army under the command of Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar declared on Saturday a no-fly zone for combat aircraft in the country’s western part, where it is mounting an offensive against Tripoli, the Al Arabiya TV channel reported citing the military.

"The Libyan army declares the western region of the country a military operation zone and imposes a ban on combat aircraft flights in the area," the military said in a communique. "We will carry out strikes against any airports in the west from where sorties are made.".

The leader of the Libyan National Army, Khalifa Haftar, has launched a military operation to ‘liberate’ the capital of Tripoli where the UN-backed government is based. He has reportedly ordered strict observance of purity of arms, and that no civilians are to be harmed.

While the UN recognizes a government based in Tripoli, that government has never been able to bring order to post-war Libya, and never controlled whole swaths of the country. In its place, various warlords controlled various regions, and human trafficking and the slave trade returned to the country for the first time in over a century.

Eastern Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar has ordered his troops to move on the capital Tripoli, seat of the UN-backed government of Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj.
In an audio address broadcast to his troops and published on Facebook, Haftar ordered all army units to “advance to Tripoli,” and free the capital from “militias and terrorists.” The Thursday address came hours after Haftar’s forces captured the town of Gharyan, 100km south of the capital.

Haftar also vowed to protect foreigners, civilians and those surrendering to his troops, promising to ensure their “safety and security.”

Drone-filmed footage shows scores of Haftar's Libyan National Army (NLA) vehicles en route to the capital, most of them machine-gun-armed 'technicals.'

Fears were mounting of renewed civil war in Libya after militias allied to the government in Tripoli captured scores of troops from a powerful rival force, and the UN secretary general, António Guterres, warned he was ending a visit to the country “with a heavy heart and deeply concerned”.

Guterres suggested a key meeting with eastern commander, Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, had not resulted in assurances from the strongman leader to avoid an escalation of tensions.

“I leave Libya with a heavy heart and deeply concerned. I still hope it is possible to avoid a bloody confrontation in and around Tripoli. The UN is committed to facilitating a political solution and, whatever happens, the UN is committed to supporting the Libyan people,” Guterres said in a tweet late on Friday.

“Shutting them up. That’s what it’s about. The hangman’s drop, the crackle of the firing squad, and their secrets go to the grave. Saddam Hussein didn’t get the chance to tell us about his dealings with the US and German companies who provided the gas he used on the Kurds. And now Gaddafi’s spymaster Abdullah al-Senussi will be shot in Libya before he has a chance to tell us about the cosy relationship he had with our Western security services when he liaised between his boss, the CIA and MI6.”

US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Joe Dunford issued a statement Monday denying weekend media reports that the US plans to leave around 1,000 troops in Syria, saying the reports are “factually incorrect.”

Dunford presented the current planned “residual force” as 200, saying that this hadn’t changed since February. The US announced 200 would stay on February 21, but on February 22 officially increased that number to 400.

It’s not clear from Dunford’s statement where the “incorrect” aspect of the new report, which came out of a Wall Street Journal, exists. That report suggested that the 1,000 figure was not yet finalized, but was being discussed. Dunford’s comments didn’t include any details on what is actually being discussed, but just that nothing was finalized.

Libya is coming apart again — though of course it was never put back together in the first place after NATO's regime change war to topple Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 in the first place. Since then it's been a jihadist wasteland of three, or at times up to four, competing governments vying for control of land and resources.

And now, as Bloomberg reports this week "Libya’s most powerful warlord has his sights on the capital" of Tripoli and "even his international backers are nervous." Who are Khalifa Haftar's international backers? He was for a couple decades believed to be on the CIA's payroll while living in suburban Virginia outside Washington, D.C. in exile during Gaddafi's rule. He's also financed by the UAE and quickly emerged as a main player collecting the spoils in the aftermath of the US-French-NATO bombing campaign in support of the rebels.

Bloomberg reports the growing alarm of his international backers:

The British newspaper The Telegraph has thrown into the media space another anti-Russian misinformation about the alleged “presence” in Libya of “mercenaries from Russia”.

What is interesting: The Telergaph newspaper itself writes directly that the allegations about “hundreds of mercenaries” of the “Russian PMC Wagner” in Libya are based on rumors.

Nevertheless, the newspaper draws far-reaching conclusions from false rumors.

The newspaper claims that the “mercenaries from Russia” support the Commander of the Libyan National Army, Khalifa Haftar, in operations against terrorists in Libya in order to ensure the “economic expansion” of Moscow in Africa.

The Telergaph argues that Russia wants to prevent the West from controlling the flow of Libyan oil that goes to Europe.

Similar fake news, soaring from the newspaper pages of foggy Albion, fly in flocks in the vast media of different countries.

Experts break their heads: where are the terrorists fleeing from Syria?

And here's the answer: to Libya!

In the north of which is rich in natural resources Libyan territory.
Ahead - Europe, the future theater of war of terrorists, in the south - the African continent, where they can always, unfortunately, find bastards for dollars, ready to kill anyone anywhere.

Libya is a huge country at the crossroads of Europe and Africa. The “Sahel belt” of African and Arab countries stretches from Mauritania to Somalia. This is where the American AFRICOM is preparing new ranges for the war.

And the main question asked by the experts: WHO CONTRIBUTES TO THEIR MOVEMENT?

Answer: American and European intelligence services of the NATO alliance. That same "peacekeeping" alliance that bombed the Libyan Jamahiriya in 2011.

And again the questions ...
Who is trying to legalize the Islamic State in Libya?

Who is trying to do this through future elections in Libya?

Libya’s biggest oil field resumed production, adding another complication to OPEC’s effort to trim a global supply glut.

Sharara resumed production and is expected to reach 80,000 barrels in one day, according to people with knowledge of the matter who asked not to be identified because they aren’t authorized to speak to the media. Regular output will be fully restored in the coming days, now that the site has been re-secured after a three-month occupation at the site, state energy producer National Oil Co. said in a statement.

The field in southern Libya has a capacity of 300,000 barrels of crude a day. It was shut down in December after guards and armed residents seized it over financial demands and was then taken over last month by forces loyal to eastern militia leader Khalifa Haftar.

Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar’s self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) has been accused of war crimes and violent abuses in Libya’s south after fresh gains in the area, including a much-coveted oil field.

The LNA, whose forces are vying for control over Libya’s neglected and oil-rich south, is fighting on behalf of an eastern-based government, one of two rival administrations.

On Thursday, Haftar’s fighters took the strategic town of Murzuq after a two-week assault, boosting the eastern government’s authority in the south.

And then on Friday, the forces seized control of the nearby al-Feel oil field, the second such facility in recent weeks.

Forces of East Libya-based commander Khalifa Haftar have killed 19 people and burned dozens of houses in southern Libya, a Libyan lawmaker claimed Monday.

In statements to a local television, Mohammad Adam Lino said around 90 houses have been burnt to ashes by Haftar's forces.

"They burnt down 90 houses, including those of my brothers and father," said Lino, a member of the Tobruk-based parliament.

He added that the bodies of 19 people had been transferred to hospital in Merzek region in southern Libya.

Last month, Haftar's forces launched a military offensive in southern Libya on the claim of fighting al-Qaeda and Daesh militants and clear the area of Chadian rebel groups.

One thing that should be said about Representative Ilhan Omar’s tweet about the power of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (more commonly known as AIPAC, or the “Israel lobby”) is that the hysterical reaction to it proved her main point: The power of AIPAC over members of Congress is literally awesome, although not in a good way. Has anyone ever seen so many members of Congress, of both parties, running to the microphones and sending out press releases to denounce one first-termer for criticizing the power of… a lobby?

Somehow, I don’t think the reaction would have been the same if she had tweeted that Congress still supports the ethanol subsidy because the American Farm Bureau and other components of the corn/ethanol lobby spend millions to keep this agribusiness bonanza going (which they do). Or that if she had opposed the ethanol subsidy, she would have been accused of hating farmers.

UN Special Representative and Head of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) Ghassan Salame told Sputnik on Saturday he had received the invitation from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to visit Moscow.

"The Russian foreign minister invited me to Moscow. I hope to respond to his invitation [and to visit Russia] soon", Salame said, adding that he had received the invitation during a meeting with Lavrov on the margins of the Munich Security Conference.

Commenting on the situation of the son of late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, Hannibal, who currently is a Lebanese prison, the envoy said the UN mission in Libya was making every effort in terms of humanitarian assistance.

While the Libyan National Army (LNA) and the UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) are trying to maintain control over the country's largest oil field, there are signs emerging that the US, which is eying developments on the ground, may try to meddle in the 2019 Libyan elections, High Council of State member Adel Karamaus told Sputnik.

Commenting on US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's words about the potential flow of jihadists fleeing Syria for Libya, High Council of State member Adel Karamaus opined that this remark should be taken as an important warning.

"We expect a new wave of interference in the election process; perhaps this will be done only at the political level, but military action can't be ruled out," Karamaus told Sputnik Arabic.

Canadian PM Justin Trudeau is being investigated for illegally attempting to shield engineering firm SNC-Lavalin from criminal fraud and corruption charges involving millions of dollars in bribes to the Libyan government.

Trudeau claims he “welcomes” the probe, launched by the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner on Monday after requests from two New Democrat MPs followed on the heels of an incendiary report published last week in the Globe and Mail that placed him at the center of what the Conservative opposition has termed an “unprecedented” effort to illegally influence a criminal proceeding.

In an exclusive interview with Sputnik, Hannibal Gaddafi, the son of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, revealed how he was kidnapped in Syria and ended up imprisoned in Lebanon, and explained what he really knows about the disappearance of famous Shia religious leader Musa al-Sadr.

The recent scandal involving the desecration of a Libyan flag in Beirut and Libya’s subsequent refusal to participate in the League of Arab States’ summit in Lebanon has triggered a crisis in relations between the two countries, as influential Lebanese political party known as the Amal Movement continues to demand that Libya reveal the fate of its leader, Musa al-Sadr, and his two companions, who vanished in Tripoli decades ago.

Numerous reports comment on the water crisis that is escalating across Libya as consumption outpaces production. Some have noted the environmental context in regional water scarcity due to climate change.

But what they ignore is the fact that the complex national irrigation system that had been carefully built and maintained over decades to overcome this problem was targeted and disrupted by NATO.

During the 2011 military invasion, press reports surfaced, mostly citing pro-rebel sources, claiming that pro-Gaddafi loyalists had shut down the water supply system as a mechanism to win the war and punish civilians.

This is a lie.

The recent ruling by US District Judge Royce C. Lamberth may become a breakthrough in the 5-year long Clinton email scandal, Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel told Sputnik, asking how it happened that the Obama administration, the CIA and FBI had apparently overlooked "one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency".

"The 'Benghazi' scandal likely involves national security offenses, money-laundering, campaign-finance crimes, charity fraud, and public corruption", says Wall Street analyst and investigative journalist Charles Ortel, commenting on a US federal judge ordering former Obama officials to answer the conservative watchdog Judicial Watch's (JW) questions on Hillary Clinton's private email issue and the Benghazi scandal.

The despicable and unethical attack on Flynn immediately after his appointment by Trump was just one element of a shameful Deep State campaign to discredit and destroy the Trump presidency. As Trump’s national security adviser, Flynn had Trump’s ear. He was potentially the Deep State’s worst nightmare. Flynn knows in detail how the Intelligence Community and the FISA courts operate. With a 33-year military career, including heading up the Defense Intelligence Agency, Flynn was an existential threat to outgoing President Obama and his shameless and highly partisan CIA director, John Brennan, who cynically and criminally corrupted the Intelligence Community for political purposes on behalf of Obama and Hillary Clinton.

The Conservative Tree House linked Flynn’s fall from grace to his knowledge of what happened in Benghazi. Flynn knew how they lied and covered up the disaster that cost four American lives, including an ambassador’s.

Barack Obama has said the biggest mistake of his presidency was the lack of planning for the aftermath of Muammar Gaddafi’s ouster in Libya that left the country spiralling into chaos and coming under threat from violent extremists.

Reflecting on his legacy in a Fox News interview aired on Sunday, Obama said his “worst mistake” was “probably failing to plan for the day after what I think was the right thing to do in intervening in Libya”.

Obama has conceded that the intervention “didn’t work”.

In what Judicial Watch describes as a "major victory for accountability," a federal judge ruled Tuesday that former national security adviser Susan Rice and former deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes must answer written questions about the State Department's response to the deadly 2012 terror attack in Benghazi, Libya, as part of an ongoing legal battle over whether Hillary Clinton sought to deliberately evade public record laws by using a private email server while secretary of state.

As Fox News' Samuel Chamberlain reports, the judge's order amounts to approval of a discovery plan he ordered last month. In that ruling, Lamberth wrote that Clinton's use of a private email account was "one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency" and said the response of the State and Justice Departments "smacks of outrageous misconduct."

A mass grave of 34 Ethiopian Christians executed by the so-called Islamic State group in 2015 has reportedly been unearthed in Libya.

The bodies have been exhumed and will be eventually repatriated to Ethiopia, the Libyan interior ministry says.

Libyan government authorities found the mass grave Dec. 23 after obtaining information from arrested Islamic State members. The grave appears to be located on a farm near the coastal city of Sirte, 170 miles southeast of Misrata.

Islamic State gained control of Sirte in 2015, but United Nations-backed forces regained control of the city in December 2016 after months of deadly fighting.

Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained more than 100 pages of previously classified “Secret” documents from the Department of Defense (DOD)and the Department of State revealing that DOD almost immediately reported that the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi was committed by the al Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood-linked “Brigades of the Captive Omar Abdul Rahman” (BCOAR), and had been planned at least 10 days in advance. Rahman is known as the Blind Sheikh, and is serving life in prison for his involvement in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and other terrorist acts. The new documents also provide the first official confirmation that shows the U.S. government was aware of arms shipments from Benghazi to Syria. The documents also include an August 2012 analysis warning of the rise of ISIS and the predicted failure of the Obama policy of regime change in Syria.

Suicide attackers stormed the Libyan foreign ministry in the capital Tripoli on Tuesday, killing at least three people including a senior civil servant in an attack claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group.

A further 21 people were wounded in the attack, authorities said.

A car bomb exploded near the ministry, prompting security forces to rush to the scene, said special forces spokesman Tarak al-Dawass.

A suicide bomber then blew himself up on the second floor of the building while a second attacker died when a suitcase he was carrying exploded, he said.

A third assailant, who was unarmed and wearing a bulletproof vest, was killed by security forces outside, Dawass added.

The son of the overthrown Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, has asked for political support from Russia.

This is with reference to a source in Moscow, Bloomberg reports.

The publication writes that 46-year-old Saif al-Islam, recently released from prison under an amnesty, sent a representative in early December to meet with Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia Mikhail Bogdanov. The representative handed over a letter to the Russian diplomat for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

According to the publication, in the letter he welcomes Putin and the Russian government, reveals his vision of the situation in Libya and asks for support of his political ambitions.

Investigators have conducted a search of Belgium’s Ministry of Finance in connection to their probe of missing money that belonged to Muammar Gaddafi, the deceased former leader of Libya.

Belgian investigators on Monday interrogated a former Finance Ministry official in connection with their probe into an alleged withdrawal of Gaddafi's money from his suspended accounts in Belgian banks, the Brussels prosecutor's office reports.

In October, it was revealed that several billion euros had mysteriously disappeared from the late Libyan leader's bank accounts. At that time, some media speculated that the money could have been used to finance various militant groups in Libya.

In a somewhat cryptic remark in an interview hosted by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu raised the imaginary possibility of the establishment of two or three more "Israels" throughout the Middle East and North Africa, which he said would be located in or near present-day Libya, Afghanistan and Yemen.