Libyan govt puts army in charge of Benghazi militias

Libya's government, seeking to assert its authority over private militias following the killing of US diplomats in Benghazi, placed two powerful freelance units in the city under the command of full-time army officers on Monday.

Commanders of two units which have, with official sanction, been providing security since the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi were ordered removed and the men of the February 17 Brigade and Rafallah al-Sahati militia put under army orders. A third unit, Libya's Shield, would also change leadership, an official said.

No comment was immediately available from Fawzi Bukatif, whose command of February 17 made him one of the most powerful men in oil-rich eastern Libya since the uprising against Gaddafi last year; nor was there a reaction from Ismail al-Salabi, who had led the heavily armed, pro-government Rafallah al-Sahati.

Uncertainties and disputes over authority have seen clashes and other violence among rival groups over the past year.

The killing of US Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other US citizens on Sept. 11 - when the consulate was overrun by protesters and, some say, Islamist militants - embarrassed the interim Libyan leadership in the capital Tripoli and fuelled public anger at the continued presence on the streets of units from the revolutionary army whose loyalties are often unclear.

That popular fury after the death of a widely respected US envoy who had played a role in supporting the anti-Gaddafi rebellion drove another militia, Islamist Ansar al-Sharia, out of Benghazi on Saturday. Two similar units in the eastern Islamist stronghold of Derna disbanded on Sunday.

The army, an institution that is being rebuilt as elected leaders work on establishing democracy, took advantage of that wave of popular sentiment to order unauthorised armed groups to leave public premises in Tripoli on Sunday - an operation which a military official said on Monday had been largely completed.

Army Colonel Salah Buhlaiga said two other colonels would replace Bukatif and Salabi: "I led the negotiations and we have done it successfully," he said. "We have taken command of those two big militias."

In the office of the chief-of-staff of the armed forces, spokesman Ali al-Shaikhy named the two new commanders as Colonel Emrajaa al-Mashaity at February 17 and Colonel Salahadeen Bin Omran at Rafallah al-Sahati. Together, these units can count on many hundreds of armed men in Benghazi, varyingly equipped but most recognisable by machinegun-mounted pick-up trucks.

Shaikhy said a new commander would also be named in the next few days for Libya's Shield, another paramilitary force first formed in the war against Gaddafi and which has taken on civil defence functions around the country's second city.