Washington, United States:
Private safety contractor and ally of former US President Trump Erik Prince violated a United Nations arms embargo on Libya, UN investigators have located in a report detailed by US media on Friday.
The confidential report to the Security Council, obtained by the New York Times and the Washington Post, stated that Prince deployed a force of foreign mercenaries and weapons to strongman Khalifa Haftar, who has fought to overthrow the UN-backed Libyan government, in 2019.
The $80 million operation integrated plans to type a hit squad to track and kill Libyan commanders opposed to Hafter — like some who have been also European Union citizens, the New York Times stated.
Prince, a former Navy SEAL and the brother of Trump’s education secretary Betsy Devos, drew infamy as the head of the Blackwater private safety firm, whose contractors have been accused of killing unarmed Iraqi civilians in Baghdad in 2007.
Four who have been convicted have been pardoned by Trump final year.
The accusation exposes Prince to probable UN sanctions, like a travel ban, the Times stated.
Prince did not cooperate with the UN inquiry and his lawyer declined to comment to the New York Times, it added.
An AFP request for comment to the Hong Kong-based Frontier Services Group, for which Prince is a board member and deputy chairman, went unanswered.
Oil-wealthy Libya has been torn by civil war because a NATO-backed uprising led to the toppling and killing of dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011.
The nation has in current years been split in between a Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli, and an eastern-based administration, backed by Haftar, who has faced charges of war crimes.
Then-President Trump in 2019 praised the strongman for his part in “fighting terrorism” in Libya.
A new interim executive for the nation was selected on February 5 by the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum in Switzerland, comprising 75 participants chosen by the UN to represent a broad cross-section of society.
Haftar has pledged his assistance for the initiative.
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