New fatal clashes in Kufra

By Michel Cousins.

Tripoli, 8 January 2013:

Clashes at the university campus in Kufra today, Tuesday, left two people dead, according to Libyan news agency LANA.

It quoted the head of Kufra local council’s information committee saying that unspecified militants had started shooting indiscriminately at the campus, part of Benghazi Univerisity.  Troops were then brought in and two of the militants were killed. A student was said to have been injured while trying to get out of the capus during the fighting.

However, a member of the town’s Tebu community told the Libya Herald by phone this evening that three people died, all Tebus, one of them an elderly man.

Muhamed Bubakr claimed that the trouble started with a clash inside the campus between Zway and Tebu students. Zway militants then allegedly attacked Tebus in the town, killing the three. He also claimed that armed forces were present but did not intervene.

Kufra is now reported to be quiet but tense as the head of the local council, the local military commander and community leaders try to calm the situation and establish the reasons for violence.

A peace deal was agreed between the town’s majority Zway and minority Tebu communities at the end of July after months of communal clashes in which some 150 people died. But there have been numbers breaches since.