New Libya PM’s house attacked

TRIPOLI: Armed men attacked the home of Libya’s new prime minister on Tuesday, two days after he won a parliamentary vote of confidence but with opposition to his proposed government rising.
Libya’s General National Congress, or interim Parliament, had elected 42-year-old businessman Ahmed Miitig as premier in a chaotic vote this month to replace Abdallah Al-Thani.
“There was an attack with rockets and small arms on the prime minister’s house” in Tripoli at 3 a.m. (0100 GMT), an aide to Miitig said.
The premier and his family were in the house at the time, but escaped unharmed. His guards opened fire on the group, wounding two of them and arresting them, the official added.
Meanwhile, militia fighters stole hundreds of American-supplied automatic weapons and other equipment in a raid on a Libyan base where the US was training local forces, bringing an abrupt end to the secretive program, a report said Tuesday.
Elite US troops have been tasked since last year with covertly forming local counterterrorism units in Libya, Mauritania, Niger and Mali, part of US efforts to widen the war against Al-Qaeda in Africa, The NYT reported.