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Daesh terrorists kill soldiers in northeastern Libya

Members of the self-proclaimed Libyan National Army, loyal to Khalifa Haftar, patrol a street during clashes with militants in Benghazi's central Akhribish district on July 19, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

Two Libyan soldiers have been killed and three others injured in an attack by the Daesh Takfiri terrorists on a military checkpoint in northeastern Libya.

A witness said the assailants attacked a checkpoint run by the eastern-based Libyan National Army (LNA), located about 60 kilometers (37 miles), south of the city of Ajdabiya, at dawn Wednesday using about ten armed vehicles.

Mustafa Boufjara, a spokesman for Ajdabiya's security department, said the attackers set fire to the checkpoint, adding that one of the two slain soldiers was burned to death inside his car.

General Ahmad al-Mesmari, a spokesman for the LNA, reported that one soldier was beheaded in the incident.

Images of the incident showed charred checkpoint cabins and two burned cars.

Daesh has carried out several assaults on LNA checkpoints in recent months.

Libyan forces removed Daesh from its stronghold in the city of Sirte last December, leaving the terrorist group in control of no urban territory in the North African country.

The terrorists reportedly have been trying to regroup from desert bases since losing Sirte, nearly 390 kilometers (240 miles) west of Ajdabiya.

Libya's eastern-based commander Khalifa Haftar attends a General Security conference in Benghazi, Libya, October 14, 2017. (Photo by Reuters)

Libya has faced crisis since a US-led military intervention resulted in the downfall of long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The country has been grappling with chaos and the emergence of numerous militant groups, including Daesh.

The country now has two governments, the Government of National Accord (GNA), which is based in Tripoli and led by Fayez al-Sarraj, and the other centered in the far east, in the city of Tobruk, where the self-proclaimed Libyan National Army (LNA) commanded by military strongman Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar runs the affairs.

The UN supervised a series of negotiations in 2015 that led to the establishment of the GNA late that year. However, both Haftar and the allied eastern-based parliament have refused to recognize the UN-backed unity government.


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