(Author: Libyan Gazette Editorial Staff)
Muammar Qaddafi has been killed in his home town of Sirte. It is ironic that ISIS choose Sirte as their base in Libya and Ouagadougou Hall as their headquarters.
For months the Government of National Accord’s operation Albinyan Almarsous, that united armed groups and battalions in the fight against ISIS, has gained grounds and pushed ISIS fighters deeper into the city after many have been killed and captured. However, this has come with a cost. Many Libyan youth fighting for their country have lost their lives, many are wounded and civilian casualties of war but also at the hands of ISIS terrorists.
But today the operations’ media centre announced on Facebook that the war on ISIS has advanced on western and southern fronts and clashes have been going on at the Ouagadougou Hall for its control.
Ouagadougou Hall was one of Ghaddafi’s prides, a sprawling complex in whose great hall Gaddafi had nursed his ambition to be King of Africa. Many African leaders, grateful for the millions of oil dollars he gave them, were happy to applaud him when he held a summit for the Arab League and African Union here in October 2009. In his final hours his loyalist were fortified within the conference centre.
Anti-Gadhafi fighters walk inside a hall of the Ouagadougou conference center which was destroyed by heavy artillery fire as they take control of the building known for hosting regional meetings for Arab and African leaders in Sirte, Oct. 9.
Today ISIS fighters are finding themselves confined within the same conference centre they used for their headquarters.
Today 7 soldiers have been killed and 49 have been rushed to the emergency department in Misrata’s hospital after sustaining injury near Ouagadougou Hall.
If GNA loyal forces ultimately take over Ouagadougou Hall, the building known to many world leaders, will become a bastion for the remnants of Gaddafi’s regime and ISIS’s short lived terrorist hold in Libya.
