Spokesman: Tripoli-allied Libya forces capture key airport

Forces allied with the U.N.-supported government in Libya have captured a key airport in Tripoli from rival troops attempting to take control of the capital for over a year, a government forces spokesman said. The fall of Tripoli International Airport came two days after the U.N. announced Libya's warring parties had agreed to resume cease-fire talks following weeks of heavy fighting. Photos showing shelled Libyan commercial planes inside the airport were posted on the official Facebook page of the Tripoli-allied forces.

A representative of Hifter’s forces could not be immediately reached for comment Thursday. Since 2015, Libya has been divided between two governments, one in the east and one in the west. The east-based forces under commander Khalifa Hifter launched an offensive in April last year to capture Tripoli from the west-based Government of National Accord.

Mohamed Gnono, the spokesman for the Tripoli-allied forces, tweeted late Wednesday that troops had “liberated” the airport from the self-styled Libyan Arab Armed Forces led by Hifter. “Hifter's plan to take over Tripoli has been smashed thanks to the will of the honest children of the nation. Today, we have fulfilled our pledge to liberate Tripoli airport,” Col. Salah al-Namroush, the undersecretary of the Government of National Accord's Defense Ministry, said Wednesday.

The airport was closed in 2014 following heavy fighting that destroyed much of it. For years, flights were diverted to the Mitiga airport, which has been shut down several times since last year due to heavy shelling blamed on Hifter’s forces.

The fall of the Tripoli airport attests to the seesaw nature of the fighting between the GNA and eastern-based LAAF. In recent months, GNA-allied militias backed by Turkey, Italy and Qatar have recaptured some key towns surrounding the capital. However, the LAAF, supported by Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, have responded with a series of airstrikes. Earlier this week, the LAAF recaptured a key town that it had lost two weeks earlier to its rivals.

The North African country slid into civil war following the ouster and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.

On Monday, the U.N. Support Mission in Libya announced the warring parties had agreed to resume cease-fire talks. On Wednesday, the U.N. acting special representative Stephanie Williams held talks with a delegation representing Hifter’s forces to follow-up on the agreement. Williams is expected to hold similar talks with the west-based government in “the coming days,” the U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

The recent escalation of violence comes against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic. Libya has about 170 confirmed cases but testing remains scarce. There are fears that a large outbreak would have a severe impact given the protracted conflict and the country’s poor healthcare system. The U.N. mission said it hopes the new round of talks will "mark the beginning of calm on the ground” that can give Libyan authorities the chance to focus their efforts on curbing the spread of the virus.