Benghazi car bomb targets consulates
Print Edition
A CAR bomb exploded outside a building housing the Swedish and Finnish consulates in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi yesterday, badly damaging it but causing no casualties, Libyan and Swedish officials said.
The blast reflected the deep insecurity in the North African nation, where armed militias run rampant — many of them dominated by Islamic militants — and the central government is too weak to rein them in.
The violence is particularly sharp in Benghazi, the country’s second-largest city, which has seen frequent killings of Libyan security officials and a string of attacks on diplomatic facilities, most notably the September 11, 2012, storming of a United States diplomatic post that killed the ambassador and three other Americans.
The attack comes in the wake of a US special forces raid last weekend that snatched an al-Qaida suspect from the Libyan capital, Tripoli, spiriting him off to custody in a US warship. Many militants were angered by the raid, blaming the government — and on Thursday, gunmen briefly kidnapped Libya’s prime minister.
A Libyan security official said the car bomb was detonated by remote control yesterday in the upscale neighborhood of Benghazi.
The morning blast heavily damaged the windows and facade of the building, but there were no reports of injuries, Ursula Ahlen of the Swedish Foreign Ministry in Stockholm said. The facility was closed since Friday is a weekend day in Libya.
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