Libya news updates - June 15th.... Natos adds its voice to call for ICC lawyers to be released. Clashes between Zintan forces and Mashasha tribe - note former Gaddafi commander caught. Jadu citizens and Zintan Militia about to battle.....

http://www.libyaherald.com/nato-adds-voice-to-calls-for-icc-lawyers-release/

NATO joins calls for ICC lawyer’s release

Tripoli, 14 June: 

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen

NATO has added its voice to calls for Libya to release Melinda Taylor and three other representatives currently being detained in Zintan.

The call was made today by NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen from Australia, the home of Melinda Taylor, the leader of the ICC delegation. “I strongly regret that certain groups in Libya have arrested or withheld representatives of the International Criminal Court”, he said. I would urge them to release these individuals as soon as possible.”

Taylor was arrested in Zintan last Thursday after she was allegedly found in possession of a number of “dangerous” documents, some of which supposedly came from Saif’s former right-hand man, Mohammed Ismail, who is wanted by the Libyan government but remains at large.

Regardless of the veracity of the charges, both Taylor and her colleagues have diplomatic immunity as representatives of the ICC, which is supposed to shield them from arrest or prosecution.

In addition to Fogh Rasmussen, both ICC President Sang-Hyun Song and Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard have called for the delegates’ release.

and......

http://www.libyaherald.com/clashes-in-nafusa-mountains-continue/

Senior Qaddafi commander reported captured in ongoing Nafusa mountain clashes

Jadu, 14 June:

Clashes between Zintani forces and members of the Mashasha tribe continued today around the town of Shagiga in the Nafusa Mountains. During the fighting, the Zintanis claimed to have captured the former Qaddafi commander of nearby Gharian, Mabrouk Sahban.  They also said they had caught a former deputy of Khamis Qaddafi as well as two Tawarghans fighting with the Mashasha.

Fighting between the two groups started on Monday after the Mashasha killed a Zintani brigadesman at a checkpoint they had erected on the road to Sebha.  During clashes on Tuesday, which drew in forces from other neighbouring towns, 16 people were killed.

Despite Zintani claims today to have moved into the town of Shagiga, home to many members of the Mashasha, local residents said that it has not been captured.  However, they reported that 40 houses had been destroyed in the town by rocket fire.

Libya Herald correspondents at a conference in nearby Jadu clearly overheard heavy gunfire during the afternoon.

Sahban, who commanded Qaddafi’s forces in the Nafusa Mountains during last year’s revolution, had a reputation for brutality. After the liberation of Gharian, a few days before that of Tripoli last August, he completely vanished. It is now being said that he was being given protection in Bani Walid, which has been seen as a hub of counter-revolutionary sentiment since January.

The situation in the area threatens to be further exacerbated by the death of a brigade commander from Jadu this afternoon. Al-Sifao Omar Hablee had earlier been shot on Tripoli’s airport road. It is claimed that he had been stopped by members of Zintan’s Mohammed Madani Brigade who tried to seize his vehicle, a Toyota Land Cruiser, and that they shot him when he refused to hand it over.  He was taken to hospital where he died of his wounds.

Following his death, representatives from Jadu went to Zintan, and demanded that his killers be handed over.  It has been reported that some Jadu citizens are preparing for a possible clash with Zintan.