Category Archives: Libya

Rescued migrants hijack merchant ship off Libya

Posted on by

The 108 people picked up by Elhiblu 1 reportedly hijacked it when they learned they were being returned to Libya

A merchant ship has been hijacked by refugees and migrants that it had rescued off the coast of Libya, and is now heading towards Malta, the Italian deputy prime minister and Maltese authorities have said.

Corriere della Sera and Italian news agencies reported that 108 people were picked up by the tanker Elhiblu 1, and hijacked the vessel when it became clear that it planned to take them back to Libya.

Continue reading...

Refugees face routine sexual violence in Libyan detention centres – report

Posted on by

Abuse often filmed and sent to victims’ relatives, Women’s Refugee Commission finds

Refugees and migrants trying to reach Europe from Africa are being subjected to horrific and routine sexual violence in Libyan detention centres, a survey has found.

People arriving at the centres are “often immediately raped by guards who conduct violent anal cavity searches, which serves the dual purpose of retrieving money, as well as humiliation and subjugation”, the report by the Women’s Refugee Commission says. Many of the victims have been forcibly returned to the country by the Libyan coastguard under policies endorsed by the European Union.

Continue reading...

Italian authorities order seizure of migrant rescue ship

Posted on by

Volunteers rescued about 50 people off Libya on Tuesday in defiance of government order

Italian authorities have ordered the seizure of a charity rescue ship after it defied the government’s order not to bring refugees and migrants to Italy.

On Tuesday, volunteers onboard the Mare Jonio rescued about 50 people from a rubber boat off the coast of Libya, prompting Italy’s far-right interior minister, Matteo Salvini, to say he was ready to stop private vessels “once and for all” from bringing rescued people to Italy.

Continue reading...

Italian charity ship defies Rome to rescue 50 off Libyan coast

Posted on by

Rescue could spark showdown with government after order not to bring migrants to Italy

An Italian charity ship has rescued about 50 people from a rubber boat off the coast of Libya, prompting Rome to warn it is ready to stop private vessels “once and for all” from bringing rescued migrants to Italy.

The interior minister, Matteo Salvini, has repeatedly declared Italian waters closed to NGO rescue vessels and has left several of them stranded at sea in the past in an attempt to force the rest of Europe to take in more asylum seekers.

Continue reading...

EU declares migration crisis over as it hits out at ‘fake news’

Posted on by

European commission combats ‘untruths’ over issue after row with Hungary’s Viktor Orbán

The European commission has declared the migration crisis over, as it sharpened its attack on “fake news” and “misinformation” about the issue.

Frans Timmermans, the European commission’s first vice-president, said: “Europe is no longer experiencing the migration crisis we lived in 2015, but structural problems remain.”

Continue reading...

UK policy on migration ‘disconnected and incoherent’, MPs warn

Posted on by

Report says aid to displaced people in Africa undermined by Home Office approach to asylum seekers and refugees

The UK government’s migration policy is “disconnected and incoherent” and involves the pitting of one government department against another, a report by MPs has said.

The international development committee (IDC) urged the government to double the number of vulnerable refugees offered resettlement in Britain, up to 10,000 a year.

Continue reading...

Conflict erupts for control of Libya’s largest oil field

Posted on by

Fighting between UN-backed GNA and Libyan National Army over field closed since December

Fighting has broken out over the future of Libya’s largest oil field, as forces loyal to the UN-recognised Tripoli-based government battle Libyan National Army (LNA) forces led by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, the leading figure in fractured Libya’s east.

Al-Sharara field, 560 miles south of Tripoli, is capable of producing 315,000 barrels of crude a day – about a third of Libya’s total current output. But it has been closed by the Libyan National Oil Corporation (NOC) since December when the installation was seized by local tribes demanding the Tripoli government did more to lift the area out of poverty.

Continue reading...

Libya’s oil chief calls for national force to guard petroleum installations

Posted on by

Mustafa Sanalla says specialist unit needed to end repeated seizures of oil assets by militias

The head of Libya’s national oil company has said he wants to set up a national force armed with surveillance to protect the country’s petroleum assets after repeated seizures of oil installations by militias.

Mustafa Sanalla, the chairman of the National Oil Corporation (NOC), said the force would require an annual budget of $10m (£7.6m) and be under the control of the UN-recognised government. But the force could include members of the Libyan National Army (LNA) headed by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, the dominant figure in Libya’s east, he added.

Continue reading...

EU support for Libya contributes to ‘extreme abuse’ of refugees, says study

Posted on by

Human Rights Watch accuses EU institutions of sustaining network of ‘inhuman and degrading’ migrant detention centres

The EU’s support for Libya’s anti-migrant policies is contributing to a cycle of “extreme abuse”, including arbitrary detention, torture, sexual violence, extortion and forced labour.

According to a report by Human Rights Watch, who interviewed 66 migrants and asylum seekers in Libya last year, EU institutions and member states are continuing to sustain a network of detention centres characterised by “inhuman and degrading” conditions where the risk of abuse is rife.

Continue reading...

More than 100 migrants missing after dinghy sinks in Med

Posted on by

The vessel left Libya two days ago and started sinking after 10 to 11 hours at sea

About 117 migrants who left Libya in a rubber dinghy two days ago are unaccounted for, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has said, after three people were rescued from the sinking vessel in the Mediterranean.

“The three survivors told us they were 120 when they left Garabulli, in Libya, on Thursday night. After 10 to 11 hours at sea (the boat) started sinking and people started drowning,” IOM spokesman Flavio Di Giacomo said.

Continue reading...

Libya: reconciliation conference delay could fuel military solution

Posted on by

Political process is being sabotaged by those who believe conflict is only option, says UN special envoy

Failure to hold a national reconciliation conference in Libya could open the path to those who want a military solution to the country’s divisions, Ghassan Salamé, the UN special envoy has warned.

The conference, which was due to be held this month, is intended to be a precursor to presidential and parliamentary elections this spring designed to end the splits that have paralysed the country ever since the ousting and killing of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

Continue reading...

UN refugee chief: I would risk death to escape a squalid migrant camp

Posted on by

Filippo Grandi calls on rich countries to give proper funding for developing nations that host people fleeing conflict

The head of the UN refugee agency has said he too would do “anything” to escape if he was stuck in a squalid refugee camp, as he called on the world’s wealthy nations to properly fund services in developing countries.

Speaking to reporters after meeting the Egyptian president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, Filippo Grandi, the high commissioner for refugees, said countries are not getting enough recognition for hosting refugees, and that he would campaign for Cairo to receive more bilateral development aid to support its efforts.

Continue reading...

Refugees at high risk of kidnapping in Horn of Africa, research reveals

Posted on by

More than one in 10 people travelling through the region are taken, as smugglers boost dwindling returns by preying on people for ransom, survey finds

More than 15% of refugees travelling north through the Horn of Africa were kidnapped during their journey last year, according to what is believed to be one of the most comprehensive surveys of migration journeys.

Researchers from the Mixed Migration Centre (MMC), who conducted 11,150 interviews across 20 countries and seven migration routes, warned that kidnappings may be increasing and identified people travelling through the Horn of Africa to north Africa and Europe as the most vulnerable.

Continue reading...

Beyond Syria: the Arab Spring’s aftermath

Posted on by
The outlook is bleak for key countries including Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Libya

Just over eight years ago, Tunisian fruit vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in a bitter one-man protest outside a government office against the government. Within hours, demonstrators took to the streets of his small town, Sidi Bouzid. By the time he died in hospital just overtwo weeks later, protests had spread across the country, would soon topple the president and spill beyond Tunisia, in a regional convulsion dubbed the Arab Spring.

Related: Syria: Assad has decisively won his brutal battle

Continue reading...

Putin ‘is planting troops and missiles in eastern Libya’ in anti-western stronghold

Posted on by
Putin 'is planting troops and missiles in eastern Libya in bid to seize control of the biggest illegal immigration route to Europe', UK intelligence fears Russian president Vladimir Putin is planting troops and weapons in Libya to establish a strategic stronghold against the west, intelligence chiefs say. Prime Minister Theresa May has been warned that the country will become Putin's 'new Syria ' by using it as a base for missiles.

Two migrants die on boat left adrift by Libyan coast guard – charity

Posted on by
ON BOARD OPEN ARMS, Mediterranean: A woman and a boy adrift in the Mediterranean died just hours before help reached their damaged dinghy, Spanish rescuers said on Tuesday after finding a second woman alive in the vessel, which had been carrying migrants towards Europe. A rescue boat operated by the Spanish charity Proactiva Open Arms, with a Reuters photographer aboard, went to help the three migrants, stranded about 80 nautical miles off Libya's coast, but found two already dead.

not Real News: No court order for Obama to pay $400 million

Posted on by
An online story falsely claims a federal appeals court ordered former President Barack Obama to pay $400 million in "restitution" to the United States for money supposedly lost in a transaction with "hard-liners" in Iran. The Daily World Update article cites a nonexistent West Texas Federal Appeals Court for the 33rd District; there is no federal appeals court in Texas.