The Libyan National Army, commanded by Khalifa Haftar, escalated its attacks against Turkish military targets in the capital Tripoli, announcing the killing of dozens of Syrian mercenaries, who are loyal to Ankara, like reported by aawsat.com.

The LNA also downed a Turkish drone and destroyed Turkish air defenses at the Mitiga air base.

The drone was shot down by LNA defenses in the al-Khila region, saying the aircraft had tried to attack military positions and units.

Furthermore, LNA spokesman Ahmed al-Mismari disclosed the details of a telephone call intercepted by his forces and that exposed “terrorist Syrian gangs that were recruited by the terrorist (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan.” The telephone conversation revealed plans to combat the LNA, he added.

Mismari said that 35 “Syrian terrorists” from the Sultan Murad brigade were killed in the Salaheddine area in Tripoli.

The LNA is still committed to the truce despite the ongoing hostile terrorist operations, whether on the field, through the media or provocative Turkish statements, he declared.

The army is “always prepared to carry out any combat operation for the purpose of deterring or blocking any terrorist violation,” he vowed.

He also accused the so-called “deterrence force”, which is affiliated with Fayez al-Sarraj’s Government of National Accord, of targeting civilians, kidnapping individuals suspected of supporting the LNA or opposing what he described as criminal and terrorist gangs and “Turkish invaders”.

In the east, Haftar received at his Rajma headquarters a delegation of aides and envoys from France, Italy and Germany. They underscored the role played by the LNA general command “in eliminating terrorist militias and gangs.”

A statement from the general command said discussions focused on the importance of stability in Libya for the region. They were briefed on the general command’s vision for the solution of the crisis in the country and “the importance of restoring peace and stability and moving from transitional periods to permanent ones.”

These goals cannot be achieved without the elimination of terrorist militias that have not respected their commitment to the ceasefire, it added, accusing them of attacking civilian areas in Tripoli.

The general command stressed the “LNA’s right to continue its mission to liberate all Libyan territories in honor of the sacrifices and heroics of its martyrs, who were killed in their pursuit of the aspirations of the Libyan people to live in a country ruled by the state of law, justice and equality.”

In Tripoli, Sarraj chaired a government meeting, which notably did not comment on the resignation of United Nations envoy to Libya Ghassan Salame. The gatherers instead focused on financial affairs amid the shutdown of oilfields by tribesmen loyal to the LNA.

Moroccan authorities dismantled a terrorist cell in the northeastern city of Sidi Slimane, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

The Central Office of Judicial Investigations arrested four pro-ISIS members aged 23 to 51, which came within the government’s efforts to arrest extremist members making terrorist plots.

Authorities seized electronic devices, bladed weapons, a military trellis and several manuscripts that proved the cell’s affiliation to ISIS, said the ministry.

Initial investigations have revealed that the leader of this terrorist cell, who was arrested in 2014 for terror charges following the dismantling of another terrorist cell that used to recruit militants and send them to Syria and Iraq, had recruited the members of his cell who share the same extremist thoughts.

The suspects planned to carry out terrorist projects aimed at undermining the security of citizens and destabilizing the public order.

The latest operation is part of ongoing efforts by Moroccan security services to address all threats likely to undermine the country’s security and stability.

During the Arab Interior Ministers 37th Session in Tunis, Noureddine Boutayeb, Minister Delegate to the Minister of the Interior, said that the authorities have laid a security strategy to ensure the safety of citizens and maintain stability in the country.

He added that Morocco has always been keen to reinforce regional and international cooperation through signing several multilateral and bilateral agreements in fields of security and fighting terrorism.

In this context, Boutayeb highlighted the role of the Global Counterterrorism Forum in understanding this global calamity and putting effective policies and tangible measures.

In order to raise awareness and empower schoolchildren with practical tools to become safer road users, UNIFIL French peacekeepers together with Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces personnel carried out a pedestrian and road safety awareness campaign in a south Lebanese village last week.

French gendarmes of UNIFIL’s Force Commander’s Reserve (FCR) gave the training to 60 young students of the Burj Qalawiyah Public School on 11 February 2020.

For UNIFIL French peacekeeper, Warrant Officer Cyril, raising awareness while also teaching road safety habits and pedestrian behaviour skills for children is one of the main objectives of this campaign.

“The goal is to educate the students so that they adopt the right behaviours when they are on foot,” he said. “Because of their small size, they are more vulnerable than adults because they are less visible, and it is important that they learn to move around or to cross a road safely.”

Warrant Officer Jean-Marc, a UNIFIL French peacekeeper who also attended a presentation alongside schoolteachers, hopes that this training initiative provides vital tools for children who are exposed to the dangers of the road.

“One of the main roles we have back home is to watch over road safety, so within this context, we are used to carrying out awareness-raising activities with children,” he elaborated. “We are also fortunate to work together with our Lebanese counterparts to lead these type of activities.”

This training session ended with a dynamic and practical quiz, about the body’s natural and automatic reflexes, in which the 60 children participated with great enthusiasm. Each child was thus given their pedestrian permit with a reflective bracelet to wear to make them more visible to motorists.

This pedestrian and road safety awareness campaign for children will continue in other schools in southern Lebanon, giving the chance to save lives that would otherwise be needlessly lost.

Between their core peacekeeping duties, UNIFIL peacekeepers regularly carry out various activities like this one in support of and as requested by the host communities, which – together with their operational activities – have helped keep calm in the Mission’s area of operation for over 13 years.

Source: https://unifil.unmissions.org/unifil-french-peacekeepers-conduct-road-safety-campaign-schoolchildren

As many as 16 Turkish soldiers have been killed by the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by General Khalifa Haftar, a senior official in the LNA claimed according to middleeastmonitor.com.

The statement by Colonel Khaled Al-Mahjoub, director of the Department of Moral Guidance, comes days after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced that his country’s forces have been fighting alongside the internationally-recognised Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) against Haftar’s forces.

The Turkish president also acknowledged that a number of Turkish soldiers were killed in Libya.

“We are there [in Libya] with our soldiers and our teams from the Syrian National Army. We continue the struggle there. We have several martyrs. In return, however, we neutralised nearly a hundred [of Haftar’s] legionaries,” he said.

Israeli air strikes targeting the Islamic Jihad militant group in the Gaza Strip and Syria killed at least six fighters, a war monitor said Monday; the strikes came after members of the jihadist group fired a barrage of rockets at Israel.

The Israel Air Force targeted “Islamic Jihad terror sites” throughout Gaza and near the Syrian capital Damascus, an IDF statement said.

While carrying out its core tasks aimed at maintaining calm and stability in southern Lebanon in accordance with UN Security Council resolution 1701, UNIFIL peacekeepers, in coordination with the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), conduct vehicle and foot patrols in their area of ​​operations between the Litani River and the Blue Line, despite the rough terrain and harsh winter weather conditions

For UNIFIL Indian peacekeeper, Captain Rishabh Kumar Nashine, these patrols are an extremely important part of the Mission’s mandate.

“Basically, we carry out various patrols such as section foot-vehicle patrols, and community engagement market walks,” Cpt. Nashine said.

“The main objective of these patrols is to ensure that in the area peace prevails and prevents incidents. But, if something happens then it must be observed, monitored and reported to the headquarters,” he added.

These ground operations help maintain the overall calm and stability along the Blue Line and within the Mission’s 1,060 square kilometre area of operations – a stability that has prevailed since 2006.

“The terrain and weather conditions are not an issue for us because we are adequately equipped, so this is not a main concern. Our main concerns are regarding the communication, but to avoid any miscommunication or misinterpretation, we do have our language assistants with us at all times,” he noted.

In the Shab’a area, these coordinated activities usually involve clearing transit and supply road routes for the local population.

Another UNIFIL Indian peacekeeper, Captain Deepak Kumar, shares some insights on the presence of UNIFIL peacekeepers in the area of operations, especially near Shab’a.

“It is important to monitor the activities of shepherds who take their herds near the Blue Line in order to avoid any violations and thus maintaining the sanctity of the Blue Line,” he said.

“The stability and peace remain our prime objective and getting to know well the area of Shab’a and its nearby areas needs to be taken into account,” he concluded.

However, the military patrols do not sum up everything that has been done by UNIFIL, especially in that area with rugged routes usually blocked by snow in winter time. In such a situation, UNIFIL uses its heavy vehicles to open roads, deliver food supplies as well as assisting the local population, shepherds, their livestock and herds with their immediate needs. UNIFIL’s veterinarian peacekeepers from India and Spain, stationed in the area, also provide vet services to livestock, including vaccines and essential medicines.

Source: https://unifil.unmissions.org/unifil-peacekeepers-perform-their-duties-any-clime-and-place

UNIFIL Head of Mission and Force Commander Major General Stefano Del Col today chaired a Tripartite meeting with senior officers from the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) at the UN position in Ras Al Naqoura.

Discussions focused on the situation along the Blue Line, air and ground violations as well as other issues within the scope of UNIFIL’s mandate under UN Security Council resolution 1701.

Major General Del Col said: “I appreciate the positive engagement of the parties with UNIFIL that has enabled continued stability along the Blue Line in a volatile regional context.” And he added: “I call on the parties to further utilise UNIFIL’s tripartite and liaison mechanisms to address issues and concerns in order to minimize the scope for any misunderstandings that could cause tensions or incidents.”

He reiterated his call to the parties to provide UNIFIL with sufficient prior notification of all planned activities along the Blue Line.

Tripartite meetings have been held regularly under the auspices of UNIFIL since the end of the 2006 war in south Lebanon as an essential conflict management and confidence building mechanism.

Source: https://unifil.unmissions.org/unifil-head-chairs-tripartite-meeting-laf-and-idf-officials-0

Just after the EU’s foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell urged Europe to “develop an appetite for power” to better chart its own independent course in solving various international crises impacting Europe, the EU has agreed to deploy warships in order to enforce a United Nations arms embargo on the war-torn country, like reported by zerohedge.com.

The EU has stressed, however, that this is not an extension of its prior controversial mission to rescue migrants and refugees in the Mediterranean:

Josep Borrell, the EU’s chief diplomat, announced that 27 foreign ministers had agreed to launch a new operation with naval ships, planes and satellites in order to enforce the UN arms embargo on Libya.

To counter objections that the operation could morph into a rescue mission, Borrell promised the ships would be withdrawn if they became “a pull factor” that encouraged people to attempt the risky crossing from Libya to Europe. This commitment helped lift opposition to the mission from Italy and Austria, whose governments had blocked an earlier compromise.

Going all the way back to the 2011 US-NATO intervention to topple Gaddafi, the north African country has existed in a state of anarchy with multiple governments and factions vying for control, and now Benghazi-based strongman Khalif Haftar is attempting to bring the country by force under his control in his bid to seize the capital.

This has set the stage for a major proxy war involving the UAE as the prime weapons supplier of Haftar, and Turkey as supplying weapons, drones, and even troops to the Tripoli Government of National Accord (GNA). Russia has also reportedly supplied Haftar’s army with mercenaries from the Wagner group.

The fighting in Libya as well as the external arms supplies fueling both sides of the conflict has become so bad that the United Nations has called an arms embargo recently in place “a joke”.

“The arms embargo has become a joke, we all really need to step up here,” U.N. Deputy Special Representative to Libya Stephanie Williams said days ago at an international security conference in Munich.

“It’s complicated because there are violations by land, sea and air, but it needs to be monitored and there needs to be accountability,” Williams added, and noted further that Libya has over the past multiple months of fighting been flooded with advanced weapons.

This newest EU operation appear’s the bloc’s attempt at a more muscular response in the wake of frustration over “not doing anything”.

Austria’s foreign minister, Alexander Schallenberg was quoted in The Guardian Tuesday as saying, “There is a basic consensus that we now want a military operation and not a humanitarian mission.”

The details of the new mission to block all arms going into Libya, dubbed Operation EU Active Surveillance, are as follows:

Ships under the new mission – to be known as Operation EU Active Surveillance – will patrol about 60 miles (100km) off the coast of Libya, an area of the Mediterranean that is the main route for weapons into the country.

An internal EU memo, released by the London-based civil liberties group Statewatch, underscores that the EU does not expect to be involved in rescuing people. “Naval assets can be deployed in the areas most relevant to the implementation of the arms embargo, in the eastern part of the area of operation or at least 100km off the Libyan coast, where chances to conduct rescue operations are lower,” it says.

It’s widely believed that should ‘mission creep’ occur and the European military ships get pulled into a costly ‘rescue mission’ upon possibly encountering stuck migrant ships in the area, the whole operation will lose political backing and momentum.

There’s also concern that the mere presence of EU ships will only serve to encourage more migrants to attempt the dangerous Mediterranean crossing.

UNIFIL and its strategic partner, the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) allowing for the two forces to enhance cooperation, after a decade, in humanitarian demining within the UN Mission’s area of operation in south Lebanon.

The MoU – signed by UNIFIL Chief of Staff Brigadier General Frédéric Boucher and the Director of the Lebanon Mine Action Centre (LMAC) Brigadier General Gihad Al Bechelany – sets out a framework of cooperation for UNIFIL assistance, without prejudice to its mandate and within existing capabilities and resources, to LMAC’s humanitarian demining operations in UNIFIL’s 1,060 square kilometres area of operation between the Litani River and the Blue Line.

In the wake of the 2006 war and till 2010, UNIFIL deminers conducted, within the framework of UN Security Council resolution 1701, humanitarian demining in order to protect civilians and to facilitate safe access to dwellings and agricultural land. Due to operational requirements of its mandate to facilitate the Blue Line marking, and to ensure the safety of patrols carried out by UNIFIL peacekeepers, these activities were suspended in 2010.

“Now, after 10 years, the operational situation allows us again to resume our efforts in the area of humanitarian demining,” said Brig. Gen. Boucher after signing the MoU in the LAF’s Regional School for Humanitarian Demining in Hammana, east of Beirut.

Highlighting the importance of UNIFIL-LAF cooperation, Brig. Gen. Bechelany said Lebanon still has more than 40 million square metres of land contaminated with deadly mines.

“Our special cooperation that starts today, reflects our great aspirations. Despite the challenges and difficulties, we believe that our battle against mines is a winning and settled battle,” he added. “We also believe that close cooperation between the LAF and UNIFIL, the official institutions and local and international NGOs is the title for success in reaching our highest common goal.”

UN Mine Action Service (UNMAS) Programme Manager Alan Macdonald said the new MoU allows for the opportunity of UNIFIL demining assets to work on hazardous areas within the UNIFIL area of operation.

“The MoU sets out a way of working together on demining and thereby also enhancing the partnerships that already exist between UNIFIL and the LAF,” said Mr. Macdonald. “Removing the landlines and unexploded ordnances removes a factor impeding the economic development of Lebanon – and most importantly removes from families and communities a fear of death or injury.”

Despite progress, large swathes of land in south Lebanon are still contaminated with landmines.

UNIFIL currently has peacekeepers from Cambodia and China undertaking the deadly task of clearing contaminated areas along the 120-km Blue Line and around UN positions in south Lebanon. In 2019 alone, they cleared more than 42,000 square metres of land, and destroyed 3,358 anti-personnel mines.

“UNIFIL will continue to apply the maximum endeavor in support to the Lebanese authorities and particularly to the LAF and the LMAC, which are crucial to succeed in the mission’s efforts to consolidate peace,” said the UNIFIL Chief of Staff, Brig. Gen. Boucher.

Source: https://unifil.unmissions.org/unifil-and-laf-sign-mou-consolidate-cooperation-around-humanitarian-demining

Winters are harsh in Kfar Shouba on both locals and UN peacekeepers, as well as infrastructure. During the winter, the limited width of the road that leads to this faraway south-eastern Lebanese village – combined with snowstorms, rains and poor road conditions – is a safety hazard for all.

Therefore, UNIFIL embarked on rehabilitating over 3,200 metres of this road. The first expansion was inaugurated by UNIFIL Sector East Commander Brigadier General Marcos Llago Navarro in early February.

 He told a group of dignitaries, including the mayor, village elders, religious leaders, and Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) representatives that the road is essential for the community and the UN Mission alike.

 “UNIFIL has contributed to the first stage of this project with the expansion and rehabilitation of the village road in this area, in partnership with the Municipality of KfarShouba,” he added.

The rehabilitated road will provide better safety conditions and will contribute to long-term development of this community.  

This road is a vital artery for the local farmers for reaching their agricultural lands and the pond, which is the main source of agricultural water in the village. It is also an essential road for coordinated military operations, regularlyused by UNIFIL and LAF personnel to carry out their duties daily. 

The Mayor of Kfar Shouba, Kassem Qadri, said the road, first built in the 1980s, represents the only path available for the local communities to access their agricultural lands and farms.

“Over the four decades since it was built, this road has sustained a lot of damages due daily heavy use by military and civilian vehicles,” he added. “The Municipality Council, in cooperation with UNIFIL, managed to complete the first phase of this project which will benefit the local population, as well as UNIFIL and the Lebanese Armed Forces.”

The successful implementation of this project will enhance livelihoods. 

Local villagers hope that a much better, all-weather good road will bring security, peace and stability to an area marred by daily heavy use of military and civilian vehicles.A decent road, among other benefits, enables UNIFIL peacekeepers and LAF soldiers to continue to carry out necessary operational activities.

Between their core peacekeeping duties, UNIFIL peacekeepers regularly carry out various activities in support of and as requested by the host communities, which – together with their operational activities – have helped keep calm in the Mission’s area of operation for over 13 years.

Source: https://unifil.unmissions.org/road-renewed-hope-kfar-shouba