TRIPOLI, Aug 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) — New evidence has uncovered that a drone operated by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) killed 26 unarmed cadets at a military academy in Libya’s capital Tripoli in January 2020.
At the time of the strike on Jan 4, Tripoli was under siege by the self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA).
It has denied responsibility for the attack and suggested the cadets had been killed by local shelling.
But evidence indicates the cadets were hit by a Chinese Blue Arrow 7 missile.
This was fired by a drone called the Wing Loong II and investigation found evidence that, at the time of the strike, Wing Loong II drones were only operating from one Libyan air base – Al Khadim – and that the UAE supplied and operated the drones that were stationed there.
The UAE has previously denied military involvement in Libya and says it supports the UN peace process.
Just after 21:00 on Jan 4, around 50 cadets were doing routine drills at a military academy in the south of Tripoli.
Without warning, an explosion detonated in the centre of the group, leaving 26 cadets dead or dying on the parade ground. Many were still teenagers. None of them were armed.
One of those who survived was 20 year-old Abdul Moeen.
He was inside the academy when the strike hit.
“We were witnessing our colleagues dying, breathing their last breath, and we couldn’t do anything… There were guys whose torsos were separated from their bodies. It was an awful crime, a crime that has nothing to do with humanity.”
Seven months after the strike, no-one has admitted responsibility for killing these young men.
The LNA, under Gen Khalifa Haftar, denied that it was behind the strike and told the press that the explosion might have been caused by a locally fired mortar shell or an attack from inside the academy.
The investigation found evidence that a much more sophisticated weapon was used.
Just three weeks before this strike, the UN also concluded that the Blue Arrow 7 “is ballistically paired to be delivered by the Wing Loong II… and by no other aviation asset identified in Libya to date”.
In 2019, the UN found that, by sending Wing Loong drones and Blue Arrow 7 missiles into Libya, the UAE had violated the UN arms embargo on the country, which has been in force since 2011.
Both the UAE and Egypt attended a conference on Libya convened by German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin in January this year, where they reiterated their support for the UN peace process and agreed to refrain from intervention in Libya’s war.
But in the past year, there has been an escalation in the use of drones by both sides in the conflict.
Ghassan Salamé, the former head of the UN mission in Libya, described this as “possibly the largest drone war theatre now in the world”.
The UAE is not the only foreign power involved in this conflict.
Turkey was also in breach of the UN arms embargo on Libya by sending secret shipments of weapons to the UN-recognised government in Tripoli.
With the backing of Turkey, the UN-recognised Government of National Accord has now beaten back Gen Haftar’s LNA from the area around Tripoli.
