Car bomb in Libya’s Benghazi kills two UN staff

Libyans gather at the site of a car bomb attack in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi on August 10, 2019. (AFP)
Updated 10 August 2019
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Car bomb in Libya’s Benghazi kills two UN staff

  • There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast, which happened as a UN convoy was passing through the area
  • The LNA on Saturday announced a truce around Tripoli for the three-day Muslim festival of Eid Al-Adha, after the unity government conditionally accepted a ceasefire called for by the UN

BENGHAZI: A car bombing in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi killed two United Nations staff on Saturday, a security official said.
"Two members of the UN mission, one them a foreigner, were killed and at least eight others wounded including a child, by a car bomb" in a shopping area of the Al-Hawari district, the official said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast, which happened as a UN convoy was passing through the area.
Benghazi, Libya's second city and the cradle of the 2011 uprising that overthrew dictator Muamar Qaddafi, was hit by years of violence targeting diplomatic offices and security forces after his fall.
An attack on the US consulate on September 11, 2012, killed US ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.
In 2017, military strongman Khalifa Haftar drove hardline extremists out of Benghazi after a three-year battle.
Haftar, who backs an eastern-based administration that opposes the Tripoli-based unity government, went on to seize Derna, the last city in eastern Libya outside his control.
But bombings and kidnappings have continued.
A May 2018 attack left seven people dead and last month, a car bombing at the funeral of an ex-army commander killed at least four people and wounded more than 30 others.
A Libyan lawmaker is also feared to have been abducted by an armed group in the eastern city, the UN and lawmakers said in July.
Haftar controls most of eastern Libya, and early this year he ordered his self-styled Libyan National Army to purge the south of what he called "terrorist groups and criminals".
On the heels of that campaign, his LNA launched in April an offensive to take the Libyan capital from the UN-recognised Government of National Accord.
The LNA on Saturday announced a truce around Tripoli for the three-day Muslim festival of Eid Al-Adha, after the unity government conditionally accepted a ceasefire called for by the UN.


Red Cross transfers 8 Palestinians from Israeli detention to Gaza

Updated 23 February 2026
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Red Cross transfers 8 Palestinians from Israeli detention to Gaza

  • They were taken across the Karm Abu Salem border crossing to Shuhada Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah, where they were reunited with their families

LONDON: The International Committee of the Red Cross transferred eight Palestinians from Israeli detention to the Gaza Strip on Monday.

The organization took them across the Karm Abu Salem border crossing to Shuhada Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah and helped reunite them with their families.

The Red Cross has been unable to visit Palestinian detainees in Israeli detention centers since October 2023, as a result of which the fate and location of many detainees from Gaza were unknown, the Palestinian Wafa news agency reported.

The Red Cross said that according to the principles of international humanitarian law, detainees must be treated humanely, held in proper conditions and allowed to have contact with their families.

Israel is holding about 9,245 Palestinian prisoners in jails, including 358 held without charge or trial under administrative detention, according to Jerusalem-based rights group HaMoked.