Ghadames local council says town is besieged

Tripoli, 19 January 2013:

Ghadames local council has said that it is under siege by a group of militiamen positioned around the town.

In a statement today, Saturday, sent to the Libyan news agency LANA, the council condemned the use of force and called for help to end the siege.

According to the council’s Facebook page, the group are refusing to let people in or out of the border town and are threatening to enter it itself.  The group is not identified other than being reportedly led by a man named as Al-Ramakh.

Last Saturday, Ghadames hosted the triparate summit at which Libyan Prime Minister Ali Zeidan and his Algerian and Tunisian counterparts, Abdulmalik Sellal and Hamadi Jebali, agreed a number of measures to improve border security.

During the past year, there have been clashes in Ghadames and surrounding areas between Arabs and Tuareg who were accused of supporting Qaddafi during the revolution and who, in September 2011, fled the town after a series of attacks.

The government has tried to resolve the issue on a number of occasions but to no avail.

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