CAIRO: Protesters in Benghazi have stormed the headquarters of Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC) on Saturday while the Council's chairman Abdul Jalil was still in the building, according to a Reuters report. The Benghazi protests were staged to call for more transparency from within the NTC, especially in the way that Libyan assets have been spent. The protests were also set to demand the removal of all officials affiliated with the regime of former Libyan leader Muammar Ghaddafi and a quicker pace for reform. The protest was attended by hundreds of Libyan men, many of whom had sustained injuries in the nine-month civil war that ousted Ghaddafi. Police fired tear gas canisters on the crowd when Abdul Jalil tried to address the protesters, who threw plastic bottles at him. Jalil was brought to safety before protesters stormed the building, throwing rocks at it and breaking its windows. Impatient over the slow pace of reform in Libya, the protesters also damaged Jalil's car. The division between the NTC and the Libyan protest movement shows a growing tension over the affairs of the nation after the overthrow of the Ghaddafi regime. NTC officials say that they cannot fire every official simply because they worked under the former regime. They do swear that anyone guilty of corruption or abuse will be fired, however. Protesters however drafted a proposition in which they pushed to have anyone fired who had a position of responsibility within the former regime or financially benefited from the former regime. Libyan protesters became angry with the organizers of the African Cup on Saturday when it was discovered that the Cup officials had put up the flag of Libya under the former regime to represent the country's soccer team, demanding its immediate removal. Elections for a newly formed 200-member national assembly will take place in Libya next June, but protesters have demanded more visible change in the meantime. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/d5WmH Tags: Benghazi, National Transitional Council, Reform Section: Latest News, Libya
