Arab League to hold emergency Libya meeting

The Arab League plans to hold an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss mounting violence in Libya which has seen UN staff evacuated and a major airport shuttered this week.

"Arab League permanent delegates will discuss a report prepared by the league secretary-general's representative in Libya, Nasser al-Qodwa, based on communications he conducted in Libya," the source, requesting anonymity, told Anadolu Agency.

The source said that Arab League Secretary-General Nabil al-Arabi had called for the meeting earlier this week at an Arab Foreign Ministers gathering in which they also discussed Israel's week-long campaign against the Gaza Strip.

Earlier this week, Libya's neighbours, concerned with potential spillover from the country's turmoil, also issued a call for dialogue in Libya and agreed to help broker talks.

Since May, Benghazi has witnessed fighting between renegade general Khalifa Haftar's forces and Islamist militias, the latter of which have become a common feature of post-Gaddafi Libya.

Haftar’s offensive has left more than 200 dead in Benghazi, but has not yet succeeded in its aim of triggering a general uprising against Islamists.

The government in Tripoli declared Haftar's move as an "attempted coup" while Haftar insists he is waging a war on "rogue militias" in the volatile city.

Airport on lockdown 

A spike in the level and intensity of violence in Libya has let to the government declaring on Tuesday that it may have to consider calling for international forces to help re-establish security. This came in the wake of deadly clashes which closed Tripoli airport, severing air links with the outside world.

The locked-down airport came under renewed attack late Monday when dozens of rockets - including one that hit a plane - were fired, killing a security guard and injuring six others, officials said.

Al-Jilani al-Dahech, a security official at Tripoli airport, told AFP that the control tower was hit along with a plane belonging to private Libyan carrier Buraq Airlines. An AFP photographer sighted several passenger aircraft on the tarmac riddled with bullets.

On Monday, Libya also suspended all flights to and from its third largest city of Misrata, west of the capital, which is dependent on Tripoli airport for its operations.

"Libya is now practically cut off from the outside world," a source at the airport said.

Shortly after the attack the government released a statement saying it was "looking into the possibility of making an appeal for international forces on the ground to re-establish security and help the government impose its authority".

The statement from a spokesman added that the forces would help protect civilians, prevent anarchy and allow the government to build up the army and police.

International air power helped overthrow dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, sparking a power struggle between rival armed groups that has wracked the oil producing state.

UN staff evacuate

Fighting between militias has intensified since a general election in June and on Monday, the United Nations announced it was evacuating its remaining staff from Libya because of the deteriorating security situation.

"This is a temporary measure. Staff will return as soon as security conditions permit. The United Nations, which stood by the Libyan people in their revolution in 2011, will not abandon them as they seek to build a democratic state."

Witnesses said a UN convoy left Tripoli on Sunday by road headed for the Tunisian border, 170 kilometres (110 miles) to the west.