Airstrike on Tripoli academy kills over 30 students

Tripoli-based government blames airstrike on LNA, with at least another 33 wounded.

LONDON - An airstrike slammed into a military academy in Libya’s Tripoli killing at least 30 people, mostly students, health authorities said Sunday.

The airstrike took place late Saturday in the capital’s Hadaba area, just south of the city centre where fighting has been raging for months.

The ambulance service in Tripoli said the airstrike also wounded at least 33 others. It posted images of dead bodies and wounded people being treated at a hospital.

Tripoli has been the scene of fighting since April between the self-styled Libyan National Army led by General Khalifa Haftar and an array of militias loosely allied with the weak but UN-supported government that holds the capital.

The Tripoli-based government blamed the airstrike on the LNA.

A spokesman for Haftar’s forces did not respond to phone calls seeking comment.

The fighting for Tripoli escalated in recent weeks after Haftar declared a “final” and decisive battle for the capital. That followed a military and maritime agreement Tripoli authorities signed with their ally Turkey calling for the deployment of Turkish troops to Libya.

The fighting has threatened to plunge Libya into violence and chaos rivalling the 2011 conflict that ousted and later killed its ruler Moamer Kadhafi.