Demonstrators demanding greater sovereignty for eastern
Libya have looted the offices of the electoral authority in Benghazi. Over 300
people chanting slogans of independence took ballot boxes out of the building
and burned documents in the street.
Libya, which is still recovering from the civil war that
brought down Colonel Mu'ammar Qadhafi, is to elect a new parliament on
Saturday 7July. Pro-autonomy leaders in eastern Libya, however, have called on
the nation to boycott the vote. They are demanding that eastern Libya be given
a larger share of seats in the new 200-member legislature, which is tasked with
drawing up a constitution.
The country's electoral law allocates 60 seats to eastern
Libya, 102 seats to western Libya and 38 to the remainder of the country.
Speaking to AFP news agency, Head of Benghazi's High National Election
Commission Jamal Bukrin said: "A group of people entered the
commission's premises, ransacked the offices and destroyed what they found
inside the building."
The call to shun Saturday's vote was made by a group that
has proclaimed itself the authority of a semi-autonomous territory in
Cyrenaica, or eastern Libya. Speaking about the outbreak of violence, one of
the movement's leaders Abdeljawad al-Badin said it was the protesters' "reaction
to the authorities disregard for their demands".
It is estimated that Cyrenaica contains two-thirds of
Libya's oil reserves. It was one of three regions that formed part of a federal
system before 1963, along with Tripolitania around the capital Tripoli in the
north-west and Fezzan in the south-west.
For more news and expert analysis about Libya, please see Libya Focus and Libya Politics & Security.
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