Car bomb kills 10 in Benghazi

People gathered at the scene of a car bomb explosion outside a hospital in Benghazi, Libya, yesterday. Photo: Reuters

At least 10 people have died after a car bomb exploded near a hospital in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi yesterday in one of the biggest attacks since the end of the civil war that ousted former dictator Muammar Gaddafi.

Attackers used a remote control to detonate the explosives-laden car, which was parked outside a bakery near the city’s main hospital. Weapons including Kalashnikov rifles were found inside the car.

Fathi al-Ubaidi, a top commander of Libya Shield pro-government militias, said that one man has been arrested but refused to give further details.

“This is meant to kill civilians and to destabilise the security of the city of Benghazi,” he said.

According to a Reuters report hundreds of angry people gathered at the scene, blaming armed groups for the explosion and calling for them to be driven from Benghazi, which was the cradle of the uprising that ended Gaddafi’s 42 years of iron rule.

The blast damaged a dozen or more vehicles and shattered the windows of buildings nearby, and flung dust several blocks away.

Benghazi, Libya’s second-largest city and the birthplace of the revolution that led to the death of Gaddafi, has remained, like the rest of the country, largely governed by militias in the absence of unified security and military. They refused to lay down their arms despite efforts by the Tripoli-based central government to impose law and order.

The city has suffered a series of assassinations and car bombs over the past year as power struggles between militias intensify.

Last September the US ambassador in Libya Chris Stevens was killed along with three other Americans when militias launched two attacks on the mission and another American-run site in the city.