By Ashraf Abdul-Wahab.
Tripoli, 11 September 2013:
Twenty-three Egyptians were arrested yesterday by police from Salloum trying to cross the border undetected into . . .[restrict]Libya according to the Mersa Matrouh security department. Also arrested, the Egyptian daily Al-Youm El-Sabae reported, were four local smugglers who were acting as guides on the cross-border desert track.
According to some reports, the 23 were “extremists”, now common parlance in Egypt for members of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, there has been no official Egyptian statement that those arrested were anything other than ordinary Egyptians. Hundreds are said to cross the border illegally in search of work in Libya each week.
The Libyan Interior Ministry spokesman, Rami Kaal, said that Libya had not been informed by the Egyptians about the attempt or who was involved and that in any event it was “an Egyptian affair”. [/restrict]
