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By Libya Herald reporters.
Benghazi, 10 June 2017:
The Libyan National army has confirmed that forces belonging to it Omar Mukhtar Oprations Room had carried out a series of raids in Derna yesterday against the pro-Islamist forces of the Derna Mujahideen Shoura Council.
According to Colonel Ahmed Mismari, the LNA’s official spokesman, there were three attacks, all ground-based. No air strikes were involved, he insisted.
The first, he said, was against a media/information centre being used by the local “Abusleem Brigade”, which is part of the DMSC. Also targeted was a police checkpoint, which he said was completely destroyed. The third target was a clothes factory on the east coast road. It was being used as an arms and munitions store, he claimed. It too was completely destroyed.
The operation had been “very rapid”, “very successful” with “very few forces” being involved, he said.
“We know that a number of [DMSC] men were killed and injured in the fighting” he added, but noting that the LNA forces had quickly pulled out after the attacks and so did not know how many casualties they had inflicted. However, he said that he had since heard that the DMSC lost three men.
On Thursday, the chief of staff, Major General Abdul Razzak Al-Nazhuri, who is also military commander from Ben Jawad to Derna, discussed the security situation in the town as well as other issues with the man he has just appointed to act as its mayor, Ahmida Trabah.
Trabah replaces Nazhuri’s earlier appointment, Hamad Miftah Shalawi.
