{"id":17688,"date":"2018-10-09T00:24:33","date_gmt":"2018-10-09T00:24:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=17688"},"modified":"2018-10-09T00:24:33","modified_gmt":"2018-10-09T00:24:33","slug":"libyas-eastern-forces-arrest-top-egyptian-al-qaeda-fighter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=17688","title":{"rendered":"Libya’s eastern forces arrest top Egyptian al-Qaeda fighter"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

An Egyptian former\u00a0<\/span>military officer accused of being behind a string of high-profile attacks in Egypt<\/a> has been apprehended by Libya’s eastern forces, a Libyan military spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

Hesham Ashmawi was arrested on Sunday in Libya’s eastern city of Derna – located some 300 kilometres west of the Egyptian border with Libya – Ahmed al-Mesmari, a spokesman for the self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) said on Monday.<\/p>\n

The LNA published a picture of Ashmawi with blood on his face, being examined before having bandages applied. It also posted a photo appearing to show his Egyptian military identity card.<\/p>\n

\n

Another Exclusive Photo For Ashmawy the Former officer in the Egyptian Army. #????_??????<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/LMDdgwHP19<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Mahmoud Gamal (@mahmouedgamal44) October 8, 2018<\/a>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“The terrorist Ashmawy was arrested in the Al-Maghar neighbourhood in the city of Derna and was wearing an explosive vest but was unable to detonate it,” the LNA said.<\/p>\n

It said he would probably be handed over to Egypt after Libyan security officials had completed an investigation.<\/p>\n

Al-Mismari added that the family of another suspected fighter, also Egyptian, was being detained alongside Ashmawi.<\/p>\n

In December, an Egyptian military court sentenced Ashmawi and\u00a0nine other suspected fighters to death in absentia for masterminding a string of attacks, including the 2014 targeting of a security checkpoint in Egypt’s Western Desert that killed 22 soldiers.<\/p>\n

Egyptian authorities say Ashmawi heads the Ansar al-Islam network, which they link to al-Qaeda and which they accuse of an assassination attempt on a former interior minister in 2013.<\/p>\n

Renegade General Khalifa Haftar<\/a>, the Egypt-backed commander of the LNA, said in\u00a0June that his forces captured the eastern port city of Derna from a coalition of rival armed groups known as the Derna Mujahideen Shura Council.<\/p>\n

Egypt has for years been battling an armed anti-government campaign in the rugged and thinly populated\u00a0Sinai peninsula<\/a>\u00a0and elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Attacks against the government gained pace after the military overthrew democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi<\/a> of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013.<\/p>\n

Egypt launched a comprehensive military operation targeting the armed groups in February.<\/p>\n

Over the years, most attacks have targeted soldiers and police, but civilians have also been killed. Hundreds of people have died in the conflict so far.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An Egyptian former\u00a0military officer accused of being behind a string of high-profile attacks in Egypt has been apprehended by Libya’s eastern forces, a Libyan military spokesperson said. Hesham Ashmawi was arrested on Sunday in Libya’s eastern city of Derna – located some 300 kilometres west of the Egyptian border with Libya – Ahmed al-Mesmari, a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":17689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}