Tripoli - Reports suggest as many as 140 people, including civilians, may have died in an attack on an airbase in Libya. It was originally thought 60 people died when a government-allied militia tried to take over the Brak al-Shati base in southern Libya base on Thursday. The Third Force militia, which is loyal to the United Nations-backed government of national accord in Tripoli, attacked the airbase held by military strongman Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army, on Thursday. The Brak-al-Shati airbase was a bone of contention between the two competing militias based in eastern and western Libya. The majority of those who died were soldiers of the LNA, but several civilians were also killed, The Guardian reported. "The soldiers were returning from a military parade. They weren't armed. Most of them were executed," spokesperson of the LNA, Ahmad al-Mesmari said. Since the fall of dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, the African country has been torn apart by a bloody civil war. The western part of the country is controlled by the government of national unity, while the rival LNA has charge of the east. Neither recognises the other.
