Reply #3: TNC Failing to secure weapons. HRW: "No time to waste."

[chill_wind]

Libya: Transitional Council Failing to Secure Weapons
Stockpiles of Surface-to-Air Missiles, Other Arms Found Unguarded
October 25, 2011

For months we have been warning the NTC and NATO about the dangers posed by these vast stockpiles of unguarded weapons, and the urgent need to secure them. Surface-to-air missiles can take down civilian aircraft, and the explosive weapons can be converted easily into the car bombs and IEDs that have killed thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan.

(Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch)

(Misrata) – Vast amounts of unsecured explosive weapons, including surface-to-air missiles, remain unguarded in the area around Sirte, Libya, Human Rights Watch said today. The National Transitional Council (NTC), Libya’s transitional government, has promised for months that it would secure weapons facilities.

Two unguarded sites near Sirte inspected by Human Rights Watch on October 22, 2011, contained surface-to-air missiles, tank and mortar rounds, large numbers of munitions, and thousands of guided and unguided aerial weapons.

(snip)

Thousands of crates of rocket-propelled grenades, such as RPG-7 shells for tank cannons, artillery and mortar projectiles, anti-aircraft rounds, and other munitions lay dispersed for kilometers in the open desert around the second facility, also apparently moved to prevent them from being targeted in NATO strikes. Human Rights Watch spent two hours inspecting the site, without seeing a guard or any other person. Many of the bunkers had already been heavily looted.

(more)

http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/10/25/libya-transitional-council-failing-secure-weapons