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15 Gaddafi supporters arrested after clash with NTC forces in Libyan capital

15 October 2011 02:45 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. A total of 15 supporters of Libya’s fallen leader Muammar Gaddafi were arrested on Friday after they had exchanged gunfire with fighters of the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) in Abu Salim in southern Tripoli, APA reports quoting Xinhua.

The clash was the first in over 50 days after the NTC took the control of the Libyan capital in late August.

Continuous gunshots were heard in Tripoli on Friday afternoon, after scores of armed pro-Gaddafi loyalists tried to raise a Gaddafi-era green national flag in the Abu Salim neighborhood, witnesses said. Some supporters of the previous regime then fired into the sky with machine guns and roamed in the streets, chanting pro- Gaddafi slogans.

According to Anis al-Sharif, a spokesman of Tripoli’s military council, a total of 15 Gaddafi supporters were arrested after the incident which he said should not be exaggerated by the media.

Al-Sharif said that troops are sent to the Abu Salim neighborhood to search for the Gaddafi loyalists who fled the scene after the clashes.

He stressed that strict safety measures have been imposed in all entrances and exits of Abu Salim and adjacent areas.

As of Friday evening, checkpoints have been currently set up across Tripoli, and streets in the city downtown are heavily deployed with NTC fighters.

There is no immediate detail on the casualties of the incident. Some areas in Tripoli have been currently cut off of water supply, but it needs to be confirmed whether this is related to the incident.

Abu Salim, where the Abu Salim prison is situated, has been a symbolic area for Gaddafi supporters. In September, over 1,270 bodies of prisoners were discovered by the NTC in the area. They were considered to have been killed by Gaddafi’s forces in the notorious 1996 Abu Salim massacre.

A source close to the NTC said that they had received information that there were planned demonstrations after the Friday Prayer by the remnant Gaddafi supporters in Tripoli.

Meanwhile, a Xinhua witness said that clashes were also seen in the al-Hadba area in southwestern Tripoli.

As the NTC saw the first fierce clash with Gaddafi supporters in the capital in over 50 days, its fighters also met in Sirte with strong resistance from some loyalist fighters, reportedly a result of Gaddafi’s latest incitement of reprisal on a foreign radio.

Sirte, hometown of Libya’s decades-long ruler, is now one of a couple of Gaddafi forces redoubts in the country, the other being Bani Walid.