UN 'deeply disturbed' by campaign of arrests in Libya
The United Nations mission in Libya has expressed its concern over "continued abductions, arbitrary arrests, and disappearances of citizens and public figures by various security actors" in the war-ravaged country.
Among those who have gone missing is Faraj Abderrahmane Boumtari, a former finance minister.
On Wednesday, Boumtari "was reportedly detained at Mitiga Airport and taken to an undisclosed location", the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) said in a statement.
It added that "five members of the High Council of State have been reportedly banned from travelling at the same airport" in Tripoli.
UNSMIL warned that such acts create "a climate of fear, promote tensions between communities and tribes, and have serious implications for the unification of national institutions".
Oil-rich Libya plunged into over a decade of chaos after a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.
Since then, the North African country has been divided, with one administration based in Tripoli and the other in the east where it is backed by military strongman Khalifa Haftar.
The U.N. urged the Libyan authorities and security organizations to "release all those arbitrarily detained, ensure independent investigations for all alleged extra-legal detentions and abductions and bring the perpetrators to justice."
News of the Boumtari's arrest by security agents at the airport on Wednesday quickly circulated, but has not yet been confirmed by the authorities.
Members of Boumtari's tribe, the Zouaya from the southeast, threatened Thursday to block oil terminals in the east if he was not released.
But reports on social media on Thursday said that two oilfields in the south, at Al-Sharara and Al-Fil, had already been blockaded by protesters.
Source: Agence France Presse
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