“Libya under Turkish invasion”, Haftar would target Turkish ships and aircraft

Spokesman of the Eastern Libyan forces, Ahmed Mismari said on Friday 28, June that Commander Khalifa Haftar will ban any commercial flights from Libya to Turkey,

He said any aircraft or ship arriving from Turkey attempting to land in the capital Tripoli would be treated as hostile.

General Haftar Khalifa of the Libyan National Army (LNA) claims that Libya is under Turkish invasion, and as a response, his forces will arrest all Turkish citizens in Libya, deal with any entities working with Turkey.

Haftar who is angry at Turkey for providing air cover to UN-backed Tripoli government to re-take key town Gharyan this week. Last week Turkish President Erdogan acknowledged selling weapons to UN-backed GNA however, he didn’t specify the type.

Earlier, Haftar had said that his forces are trying to free the capital Tripoli from militias which they blame for destabilizing Libya since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011.

But critics have accused him of deepening unrest by trying to seize power through force.

The constant war in Libya has left the oil-rich nation divided and caused living standards to plummet, disrupting oil production, creating a vacuum exploited by militants and causing a mass exodus of migrants to leave for Italy by boat.