Pro-Haftar forces lose strategic airport: Tripoli gov't

TRIPOLI

Libya’s UN-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) on Thursday claimed to have wrested the strategic Tamanhint airbase from forces loyal to renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar.

On its official Facebook page, the GNA’s Southern Protection Force said it had taken control of the airbase, which is located some 30 kilometers (roughly 19 miles) east of the city of Sabha.

The reported gain comes amid an ongoing counteroffensive by pro-GNA forces aimed at stopping Haftar’s attempt to lay siege to Tripoli, where the GNA is headquartered.

A pro-Haftar source, however, denied that pro-GNA forces had captured the airbase.

“We have not lost control of the airbase,” the source told Anadolu Agency on condition of anonymity due to the issue’s sensitivity.

The source went on to say that Thursday’s attack on the airbase by pro-GNA forces -- involving 15 armored vehicles -- had been repulsed.

“Fifteen armored vehicles aren’t enough to capture a fortified position like Tamanhint,” he said.

Held by pro-Haftar forces since May 2017, the Tamanhint airbase sits on the highway linking Sabha to Libya’s central Jaffra region.

After two weeks of intermittent fighting near Tripoli that has left scores dead, Haftar’s forces -- affiliated with a rival government based in eastern Libya -- have so far failed to capture the capital.

Libya has remained beset by turmoil since long-serving leader Muammar Gaddafi was ousted and killed in a bloody NATO-backed uprising in 2011.

Since then, the country has seen the emergence of two rival seats of power: one in eastern Libya, to which Haftar is affiliated, and another in Tripoli, which enjoys UN recognition.