(by Vanessa Tomassini - correspondent from Tunis) The interim UN Special Envoy, Stephanie Williams, warned of the possible use of new lethal weapons in Libya. On April 22, 2020, several reports circulating on social media indicated that the eastern armed forces would use chemical weapons against the forces affiliated to the Government of National Accord (GNA) south of Tripoli. Just a few days ago the Tripoli Interior Minister, Fathi Pashagahe accused at a press conference on Russian group of mercenaries Wagner to have carried out an attack on chemical weapons on the southern front of Tripoli and to have opened an investigation on the subject, also requested by the Libyan National Army (LNA). A classic of fiction already widely used in Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad and his allies are accused of using chemical weapons against civilians.
Although these reports are still under review, as of November 2019, I investigated the possible presence of chemical weapons already on Libyan territory and in the hands of state and non-state armed groups. Between October and November last year, a young man from Sirte, who was part of a small armed group that joined the self-styled Islamic State (Isis or Daesh) between 2014 and 2015 after several trips by leaders to Syria and Iraq , he contacted me saying that the armed groups of Misrata, under the aegis of Salah Badi, were mobilizing chemical weapons within the city.
If the man was able to provide me with evidence of his belonging to Daesh by showing me photos and videos of training in the desert, or images of the group with the classic black flags of death, he had no evidence of this mobilization of chemical weapons in Misurata.
However, I decided to investigate and from a search for information on the net, it appears that some of the chemical weapons were stolen by armed men in 2014 after having stormed the chemical factory in the district of Jufra, where they had been stored since the time of Colonel Muammar Qaddafi.
My source is convinced that this is not the only theft of chemical weapons over the years in the North African country, but in fact claims that another subtraction would have taken place during the loading operations at the port of Misrata conducted by the Organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons (OPCW) in 2014.
As you can see from the screen shot, on November 3, 2019 I contacted the organization via email to ask for explanations on these events between 2014 and 2015 in Libya, but the information office sent me back to their website asserting that all "public" material is already available online.
Il January 26, 2014, OPCW announced that Libya has destroyed the remaining mustard gas that filled artillery shells and aerial bombs, stating that Libya had completed the disposal of bulk mustard the previous year. According to the organization, by joining the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) in January 2004, Libya claimed to have nearly 25 tons of bulk sulfur mustard; several thousand discharged air ammunition designed for use with chemical warfare agents; and several chemical weapons production facilities. The declared air ammunition would have been immediately destroyed in March 2004 and in the following years the production facilities were destroyed or converted for peaceful purposes under the approval and verification of the OPCW. But is not so. The operations for the destruction of thebulk agent of sulfur mustard they started in October 2010 but were suspended in February 2011 because the destruction facility was not working properly. Following the overthrow of the government of Muammar Gaddafi, the Transition Council he claimed to have discovered a large amount of ammunition loaded with sulfur mustard that had not been declared to the OPCW. However, on the Organization's website there is no reference to the fact that thefts could have occurred during the operations carried out by the Organization which however states without specifying that “the destruction of these ammunition was a great undertaking in difficult and technically circumstances difficult. "
In 2015, the North African Post, Al Arabiya ed Asharq al-Awasat They report that the amount of chemical weapons stolen by gunmen is unknown, but they would have already found their way to ISIS-loyal militants who shortly afterwards upload online videos in which they seem to experiment with rockets loaded with chemical agents. Military sources said the same year that mustard gas and sarin gas were among the chemical weapons, the same agents that would have been used recently south of Tripoli.
"The North African PostHe wrote, quoting an officer of the Libyan armed forces, that the places where chemical weapons were stored in the country were known to the militias. In a 2014 televised speech, Ahmed Gaddaf Addam, Gaddafi's cousin and political representative of the National Fight Front revealed that in Libya there were over 20.000 tons of mustard gas before the rais died in October 2011, confirming that the destruction of some chemical weapons arsenals in Libya began after the country acceded to the Chemical Weapons Convention in 2004, but a part it had already ended up in the hands of armed groups.
In light of all this, it is clear that the possession of chemical weapons by armed groups from Tripoli and Misrata is not to be excluded. Salah Badi, leader of the Islamist coalition Libya Dawn, already included in the United Nations sanction lists, is fighting at the front against Khalifa Haftar's LNA forces. The international community and OPCW should ascertain whether these weapons are truly in the possession of these armed groups affiliated to the internationally recognized government and do everything possible to protect civilians constantly under attack by indiscriminate bombing by both sides.