Libyan NTC Threatens Intervention, But Western Towns Keep Fighting

Death Toll Continues to Rise in Clashes

Fighting between the militias for the Zwara and Ragdalein towns along the Libyan border with Tunisia continued today, with reports that the overall death toll has risen to at least 26 over the past four days.

Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) has threatened to send troops to the area and crush both sides, imposing a solution of their own, but their first attempts involving the national police ended with them getting chased out of the area.

The fighting has been escalating since the weekend, when Ragdalein forces captured members of the Zwara militia. Ragdalein spokesmen say that Zwaran militia forces have been looting homes on the outskirts of town since the end of the civil war. Zwara leaders say that Ragdalein was a Gadhafi loyalist town.

The fighting between the two towns, just 10 km from each other, is typical of the current situation in Libya, and is just the latest in a growing line of internal fighting that the NTC has struggled to tamp down in recent months.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.