Libya bombs Greek tanker, killing two and halting last air service
The chaos afflicting Libya escalated Monday after the internationally recognized government conceded that it had bombed a Greek-owned oil tanker in a port city controlled by a militant group aligned with Islamic State extremists.
The apparently mistaken bombing late Sunday prompted Turkish Airlines, the only foreign carrier still flying to Libya, to suspend flights into the country, which has witnessed a dangerous escalation in fighting in recent weeks.
Libyan military spokesman Ahmed Mesmari said the Tobruk-based government had received no information about the tanker's presence in Libyan territorial waters and "treated it as a dangerous and suspicious target that threatens national security," the Associated Press reported.
"We regret the loss of lives," Mesmari said, referring to the two crew members, a Greek and a Romanian, who were killed in the attack on the Liberian-flagged Araevo.
The Araevo, which was carrying 12,600 metric tons of oil, had been chartered by Libya's state-owned National Oil Corp., the Greek Foreign Ministry reported in a statement. It said the vessel had 26 crew members 21 Filipinos, three Greeks and two Romanians.
The bombing followed a recent spate of kidnappings and killings of Egyptian workers in Libya, where rival militias have been fighting for power since the October 2011 ouster and killing of longtime Libyan strongman Moammar Kadafi.
Egyptians seeking work and escape from their country's economic disaster have become particular targets of the more radical Muslim militias, including the Islamic State-allied militants based in the eastern city of Derna. Islamic State has terrorized much of the Middle East in a spree of bombings and beheadings and last year proclaimed a Muslim caliphate in the vast territory it occupies in Iraq and Syria.
French President Francois Hollande called on the United Nations to address the spiraling violence consuming Libya and spreading arms and insurgents to the former French colonies of the Sahel region of northern Africa.
"We are making sure to contain the terrorism that took refuge there, in southern Libya. But France will not intervene in Libya because it's up to the international community to take its responsibility," Hollande said in an interview Monday with France-Inter radio.
French forces chased Islamic militants out of northern Mali two years ago and troops, armor and war planes are based in Niger's capital, Niamey, to conduct surveillance and containment operations in those two Sahel countries as well as in Mauritania, Burkina Faso and Chad.
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Libya bombs Greek tanker, killing two and halting last air service