Kedubes AS di Tripoli Diduduki Milisi Islam Libya
Islamist Pool Party at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli
Editor : Ismail Gani
Translator : Novita Cahyadi
MILITAN Islam menyerbu komplek perumahan diplomat AS di Tripoli. Libya, Minggu, kemudian memberi kesempatan kepada para wartawan untuk meliputnya.
Kelompok militan berhasil merebut properti milik pemerintah AS setelah sebulan ditinggalkan oleh para diplomat AS menuju Tunisia, yang khawatir pada meningkatnya kekerasan di kawasan Afrika Utara dalam beberapa bulan terakhir.
Seorang wartawan dari kantor berita Associated Press melintas di komplek Kedubes AS, Minggu, setelah kelompok Dawn of Libya, sempalan dari milisi Islam lokal, yang lalu mengundang para wartawan untuk meliputnya, seperti dilansir MailOnline.
Sebagian besar jendela di kompleks diplomat itu dirusak, tapi sebagian besar sarana dan prasarana masih utuh setelah ditinggalkan pemiliknya.
Seorang komandan dari kelompok Dawn of Libya mengakui bahwa pasukannya menduduki tempat tersebut sejak pekan lalu dan bertahan di sana untuk melindungi properti tersebut dari aksi penjarahan.
Aksi pendudukan ini menjelang dua tahun kematian duta besar AS untuk Libya, Chris Stevens, dan tiga warga AS lainnya di Benghazi, kota kedua terbesar di Libya.
Sebuah video yang diunggah secara online menunjukkan sejumlah pria menikmati kolam renang yang berada di tempat tersebut, melalui Twitter.
Melalui pesan di Twitter, Duta Besar AS untuk Libya, Deborah Jones mengaku telah melihat video tersebut yang diperkirakan direkam di halaman komplek kedutaan, meskipun begitu dia masih ´sangsi´ terhadap fakta sebenarnya setelah hengkang dari Libya.
"Sepengetahuan saya dan foto terakhir yang saya terima dari Libya, bahwa Kedubes AS di Tripoli dinyatakan aman dan tidak dijarah," tulisnya via Twitter. Namun dia menolak menguraikan lebih lanjut tentang fakta tersebut. Pejabat Departemen Luar Negeri di Washington pun menolak untuk menanggapi kabar tersebut.
Pada 26 Juli lalu, diplomat AS dievakuasi ke negara tetangga Tunisia di bawah pengawalan militer AS. Departemen Luar Negeri mengatakan kegiatan operasional kedutaan akan ditunda sampai situasi keamanan membaik.
Milisi Dawn of Libya dikerahkan di sekitar Tripoli dan meminta diplomat asing untuk segera hengkang hingga keamanan pulih kembali.
ISLAMIST militiamen stormed the residential annex of America´s embassy in Tripoli on Sunday then took the time to give curious journalists in the Libyan capital a tour.
The group has taken up residence in the annex just over a month after diplomats fled to Tunisia over fears of mounting violence in the North African nation in recent months.
An Associated Press journalist walked through the U.S. Embassy compound Sunday after the Dawn of Libya, an umbrella group for Islamist militias, invited onlookers inside.
Windows at the compound had been broken, but it appeared most of the equipment there remained untouched.
A commander for the Dawn of Libya group said his forces had entered and been in control of the compound since last week and are there to protect the compound from looters.
It comes near the two-year anniversary of the death of US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans in Libya’s second-largest city, Benghazi.
A video posted online showed men playing in a pool at the compound. In a message on Twitter, U.S.
In a message on Twitter, U.S. Ambassador to Libya Deborah Jones said the video appeared to have been shot in at the embassy´s residential annex, though she said she couldn´t "say definitively" since she wasn´t there.
"To my knowledge & per recent photos the US Embassy Tripoli chancery & compound is now being safeguarded and has not been ransacked," she wrote on Twitter. She did not immediately respond to a request to elaborate. State Department officials in Washington also declined to immediately comment.
On July 26, U.S. diplomats evacuated to neighboring Tunisia under a U.S. military escort. The State Department said embassy operations would be suspended until the security situation improved.
The Dawn of Libya militia is deployed around the capital and has called on foreign diplomats to return now that the fighting has subsided.
