Region

GAZA CITY — The Gaza Strip has endured back-to-back wars and uprisings in recent years, but criminal violence has been relatively rare.

That changed Monday when masked robbers broke into a post office in Gaza City, shot and wounded a guard and made off with $500,000.

Police caught the thieves several hours later and retrieved the money, said police Col. Ayoub Abu Shaar. He did not provide details.

The Islamic militant Hamas, which rules Gaza, distributes the salaries of 40,000 government employees through post offices. Salary payments for March are to begin Wednesday, meaning post offices currently hold large sums of cash.

Hamas says it made streets safe after seizing Gaza in 2007. But it is also struggling with a cash crisis because of a tightened border blockade by Egypt.

Since December, Hamas only paid partial government salaries and the ripple effect of growing personal debt is felt across Gaza.

EILAT, Israel — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, displaying on Monday what Israel said were seized Iranian-supplied missiles bound for fighters in Gaza, urged the West not to be fooled by Tehran’s diplomacy on its nuclear programme.

Last week, the Israeli navy captured a ship in the Red Sea carrying arms that the military said included 40 M-302 surface-to-surface rockets manufactured in Syria and capable of striking most of Israel from the Gaza Strip.

Along with the missiles, some 180 mortar shells and 400,000 rifle rounds were laid out in neat piles on a pier in the southern port of Eilat. A navy missile boat that took part in the raid was docked behind the display.

Netanyahu was briefed by intelligence officers during a live broadcast on the weapons and shipping documentation that connected the stockpile to Iran.

Iran and Gaza’s Islamist Hamas rulers, both hostile to Israel  rejected the Israeli findings as fabrications.

“[The world] wants to delude themselves that Iran has changed its intention to obtain nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu said. “All I heard was a handful of soft condemnations of Iran from the international community in response to this murderous cargo.”

“But we were witness to the smiles and handshakes of Western representatives with the leaders of the Iranian regime in Tehran, at the exact same time these missiles were unloaded in Eilat,” he said.

The hawkish Israeli premier was referring to a visit to Tehran by European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

Iran and six world powers, represented by Ashton, struck a deal on November 24 under which Tehran curbed some sensitive nuclear activities for six months in return for limited relief from sanctions. Meanwhile, the two sides will try to hammer out a long-term agreement on the scope of Iran’s nuclear programme.

Iran has repeatedly rejected allegations that it is seeking a nuclear weapons capability. Israel, widely believed to have the Middle East’s sole nuclear arsenal, says a nuclear-armed Iran would pose a mortal threat to its existence.

“Before it is too late, the world must awake from the illusion it is currently in and prevent Iran from achieving the capability to develop nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu said.

TEHRAN — Iran on Monday criticised European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton over an “unsanctioned” meeting she held with rights activists, although newspapers hailed her weekend visit to Tehran.

“Contact with [civil] society is recognised in diplomatic protocol so long as it does not constitute interference in internal affairs and respects customs,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkhan said.

She said that “such incidents do not help relations”.

The foreign ministry has issued an “official caution” to the Austrian embassy, which is believed to have organised the “unsanctioned” encounter, she said in a statement carried by ISNA news agency.

Ashton, visiting Iran for the first time since taking up her post in 2009, is tasked with coordinating a diplomatic push by six world powers in talks with Iran on its controversial nuclear drive.

On Sunday, she held talks with top Iranian officials, including President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

Ashton on Saturday met with a number of rights activists, including Narges Mohammadi and the mother of Sattar Beheshti, a blogger who died in detention under unclear circumstances in 2012.

“Not surprisingly there was a big focus on human rights. I met with women activists on International Women’s Day and talked to them about the situation that women find themselves in,” she said.

Iran often draws international condemnation over its human rights record, which it rejects as a case of double standards by the West to put pressure on the Islamic republic.

Mohammadi, 41, has worked with Iran’s Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi at the Defenders of Human Rights Centre, a strong critic of the Iranian regime’s treatment of dissidents before it was shut down.

Charged with “acting against national security and propaganda against the establishment”, Mohammadi has served lengthy jail terms. She was last freed in 2012.

A hardline figure in Iran’s armed forces also condemned the meeting with rights activists.

“Ashton’s meeting with some notorious people is proof of a violation of diplomatic rules and a harbinger of future interference” in Iran’s internal affairs, said General Masoud Jazayeri, quoted by Fars news agency.

Press hails ‘cooperation era’

The EU foreign policy chief, however, won praise from the Iranian press for the official side of her visit.

“Iran and Europe enter an era of cooperation,” ran the headline in government-run daily Iran alongside a picture of Rouhani receiving Ashton.

Reformist daily Arman said her mission signalled “an extensive revision of the European Union’s approach towards Iran,” recalling a string of visits by top EU diplomats in recent months.

Another reformist paper, Shargh, argued the visit was a foreign policy success for Rouhani, who came to power in August vowing to mend strained ties with the outside world.

A traditional economic partner for Iran, Europe has been forced out of its markets, including the energy sector, after a deadlock over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions led to the imposition of sanctions.

Negotiations on a final accord to allay Western suspicions that Iran’s programme masks a military nuclear drive, despite repeated denials in Tehran, are to resume next week in Vienna.

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s transport minister apologised on Sunday for a row in which a Lebanese airliner en route to Baghdad was ordered to turn back mid-flight to pick up his son.

Hadi Al Ameri pledged to turn his son in if an Iraqi investigation found he had carried out any wrongdoing and insisted he would personally bear the costs of the Middle East Airlines flight having to turn around while travelling from Beirut to Baghdad.

“I ask you to forgive me for what happened,” Ameri said during a press conference at Baghdad International Airport in which he refused to take questions.

“The time when the sons of officials made mistakes and escaped punishment is over, and if the investigation proves my son made mistakes, I will present him to the courts myself,” he added, referring to an Iraqi probe ordered by Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki.

“As a minister, I will bear the costs of transport and the losses at my own expense, because the issue relates to my son.”

Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines said on Thursday Iraqi authorities forced its airliner to turn around some 20 minutes after leaving Beirut because Ameri’s son, Mahdi, had missed the flight.

MEA said the flight had taken off after repeatedly paging two passengers, who failed to turn up. The missing passenger was identified as Mahdi Al Ameri, and the plane turned back to Beirut.

Following the incident, Maliki ordered “all those responsible for preventing the plane coming from Beirut from landing in Baghdad” be “dismissed and held responsible,” his spokesman Ali Mussawi said.

Later the same day, the deputy head of Baghdad airport was arrested by troops reporting directly to the prime minister, but it was unclear what role the official is thought to have played in the incident.

DUBAI/CAIRO — A $40 billion deal for Dubai firm Arabtec to build one million homes in Egypt may mark the start of politically-inspired Gulf investment in the country’s creaking infrastructure, from housing to transport, power generation and agriculture.

Egypt’s economy is recovering only slowly from the turmoil that followed its 2011 revolution. Its government lacks the cash to build infrastructure, while political and business risks are still far too high for most companies to invest in projects.

But with the Arabtec deal — one of the largest construction contracts ever announced in the region — Egyptian and Gulf governments appear to have found a formula to channel billions of dollars into the economy in a way that serves their political and economic interests.

The construction company said on Sunday that it had agreed with the Egyptian army to build the homes at 13 locations around the country on land provided free by the armed forces, which own a large amount of financial assets and real estate.

The deal lets the army-backed government tackle a housing shortage that has been a grievance bringing Egyptians onto the streets in the past three years. Army chief Field Marshal Abdel Fattah Al Sisi can tout the project in a presidential election campaign which he is expected to mount this year.

By using such deals to shore up the popularity of the Egyptian army, governments in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) can keep at bay the Muslim Brotherhood, an arch-enemy of the Gulf monarchies. The Islamist movement ruled Egypt until its overthrow by the military last year.

Gulf companies awarded such projects can gain market share in Egypt with only moderate risk, since they have the backing and protection of their governments. In Arabtec’s case, the deal could help to transform it from a mid-sized firm into a regional construction giant.

“We’ll see similar deals in the coming period, whether it is in energy, oil and gas, roads,” Karim Awad, co-chief executive of EFG-Hermes, Egypt’s biggest investment bank, told Reuters. “Investors from the GCC are also showing interest in developing those sectors, including renewable energy.”

Egypt’s assistant minister of investment Neveen El Shafei said talks with potential Gulf investors “on various levels and different sectors are ongoing, and we hope more deals will be concluded in the near future”.

The importance of the Arabtec deal goes well beyond its economic impact, said John Sfakianakis, chief investment strategist at MASIC, a Saudi Arabian investment firm.

“It’s a state capitalist project of trans-national magnitude that basically tells the world that the GCC will be there to support Egypt no matter what,” he said.

Aid

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait have promised over $12 billion in aid to Egypt since last July, when the army ousted president Mohamed Morsi, who was backed by the Brotherhood. Large sums of additional aid are expected.

In the initial months, the donors focused on averting a financial crisis, stabilising Egypt’s foreign exchange reserves and helping the government to pay its operating costs. The Arabtec deal signals they have now begun trying to engineer stronger growth for the Egyptian economy, hoping to ease political tensions by cutting unemployment and raising living standards.

Construction of Arabtec’s “middle-income” homes is expected to start in the third quarter of this year, with the first to be delivered in early 2017 and the whole project to be completed before 2020, the company said.

Some details of the plan have not been released and some have not been decided. But Arabtec’s chief executive Hasan Ismaik told Reuters that initial financing would be provided by the UAE government, while the rest would come in the form of advance payments and instalments paid by the home buyers.

The homes will be bought over periods of 10 to 20 years, and Arabtec has reached agreements with 40 banks to provide financing to the buyers, Ismaik said. Last month, Egypt’s central bank said it would deposit low-cost funds at banks so the money could be lent on as cheap mortgages.

By giving a central role in the project to a UAE company, the Arabtec deal appears to ease at least partly a concern of the Gulf donors: That their money could be wasted through corruption or Egypt’s inefficient bureaucracy.

It is not clear that the project will be very profitable for Arabtec, which is listed on the Dubai stock market. This may explain the relatively sluggish reaction of Arabtec shares to the news; they rose only 1.7 per cent on Monday.

Local financial firm Arqaam Capital kept its “buy” rating on the stock but said it feared Arabtec would enjoy only modest profit margins. It also said the company would face execution risks, since it had never managed a project nearly as large.

Ismaik himself indicated he was not counting on big profits: “We look at the project more as UAE aid to Egypt than we look at its expected revenue.”

But Arabtec’s overriding motivation may not be commercial; its largest shareholder is Abu Dhabi state fund Aabar, which owns a 22 per cent stake. That makes it a logical vehicle for the UAE’s economic diplomacy.

Even if profits are slim, the firm may benefit in other ways from the project. The contract is worth about $8 billion annually, more than five times Arabtec’s 2012 revenues of $1.5 billion; by taking on the work, it may at a stroke become one of the largest construction contractors in the region.

The deal effectively uses some of the UAE’s oil wealth to finance overseas growth of one of its leading firms, in much the same way that some Chinese construction firms have moved abroad by working on projects funded by China’s government.

Aabar may already be compensating Arabtec in markets other than Egypt; last month the Abu Dhabi fund said it would assign all future construction work in its $20 billion real estate portfolio around the world to the Dubai company.

Projects

Other areas where Gulf companies are likely to consider government-backed investments in Egypt include power generation, which has been a constraint on industrial growth, oil and gas extraction, which would earn the country badly needed foreign exchange, and agriculture, since food price inflation threatens political stability.

Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, chief executive of state-owned Dubai Electricity and Water Authority, said on Monday he believed other UAE and Egyptian firms were discussing energy and petrochemical deals. He did not name the firms.

The UAE’s Dana Gas, a privately-owned firm, said last month that it was upgrading an Egyptian natural gas production plant to increase its capacity by 25 per cent.

The Egyptian government owes it $274 million in unpaid bills, according to Dana; investing in Egypt in line with governments’ wishes could help it recover that money.

Gulf firms are already active in Egypt’s farm sector. Since 2007, Abu Dhabi investment firm Jenaan has accumulated about 67,200 hectares of arable land there, growing wheat for Egyptian consumption.

The Arabtec deal “could mark the beginning of similar infrastructure projects that involve GCC companies which have experience and depth, but also the required financing and at the same time the willingness to undertake such mammoth projects,” said Sfakianakis.

HILLA, Iraq — A suicide bomber killed 37 people, including two state television employees, at a checkpoint near Baghdad Sunday, after Iraq’s premier accused Riyadh and Doha of fuelling bloodshed in the country.

Iraq has been hit by a year-long surge in violence that has reached levels not seen since 2008, driven principally by widespread discontent among its Sunni Arab minority and by the civil war in neighbouring Syria.

Analysts and diplomats have urged the Shiite-led authorities to reach out to disaffected Sunnis, but with elections due next month, political leaders have not wanted to be seen compromising and have instead pursued a hard line against militants.

The suicide bomber detonated an explosives-rigged minibus during morning rush hour at a checkpoint at the northern entrance to Hilla, the confessionally mixed but mostly Shiite capital of Babil province south of Baghdad.

The attack killed 37 people and wounded 166, a police lieutenant and a doctor at Hilla hospital said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Among the fatalities were five policemen, two women and five children, they said.

“I saw a huge fire that covered the entire checkpoint and many cars nearby,” Salam Ali, who suffered wounds to his chest and a hand, said from his Hilla hospital bed.

“Many victims could not get out of their cars because the pressure of the explosion fused the doors shut.”

Another witness, 18-year-old Kadhim Abdulhussein, said he saw pieces of metal from the checkpoint scattered dozens of metres from the scene of the attack.

Iraqiya state television said two of its employees, Muthanna Abdulhussein and Khaled Abed Thamer, were among the dead.

Militants carry out frequent attacks on security forces, and also target areas where crowds gather. The checkpoint combined the two.

Just north of Hilla, a gun attack on a police checkpoint left two policemen dead and four others wounded.

In Abu Ghraib, west of Baghdad, gunmen shot dead at least two soldiers and wounded one at an army checkpoint, while six attacks north of the capital killed three policemen and two soldiers and wounded nearly 40.

PM blames Saudi Arabia, Qatar 

In an interview broadcast on Saturday, Maliki accused Saudi Arabia and Qatar of backing militant groups in Iraq, saying they have effectively declared war on the country.

The two Sunni Gulf states “are attacking Iraq, through Syria and in a direct way, and they announced war on Iraq, just as they announced on Syria, and unfortunately it is on a sectarian and political basis,” the premier told France 24 television.

“These two countries are primarily responsible for the sectarian and terrorist and security crisis of Iraq.”

Saudi Arabia and Qatar have emerged as regional rivals.

The two countries support fighters opposed to embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad, and in recent weeks they have sparred over Doha’s backing for the Muslim Brotherhood of deposed Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi.

Baghdad has long complained of support for militant groups fighting in Syria’s civil war finding its way through to Iraq, with weapons in particular ending up in jihadist hands.

In the interview, Maliki said Riyadh and Doha provide political, financial and media support to militant groups, and accused them of “buying weapons for the benefit of these terrorist organisations”.

He also accused Saudi Arabia of supporting global “terrorism”.

Maliki condemned “the dangerous Saudi stance” of supporting “terrorism in the world —  it supports it in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya and even in countries outside” the Arab world.

Violence in Iraq has peaked to a level reminiscent of when the country was just emerging from a brutal period of sectarian bloodshed in which tens of thousands of people died.

More than 150 people have been killed so far this month and upwards of 1,850 since the beginning of the year, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources.

RIYADH — Saudi and Emirati pundits have quit major media outlets in Qatar, including the broadcaster of top-flight European football, they said on Sunday, as tensions soar between Doha and Gulf states.

In an unprecedented decision on Wednesday, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain withdrew their envoys to Qatar, which they accused of meddling in their internal affairs by supporting Islamists.

Doha has dismissed the charge, citing instead differences in regional politics.

Saudi columnist Samar Al Mogren, who writes for Al Arab Qatari daily, tweeted on Sunday that the “Saudi ministry of culture and information has decided to end the collaboration of Saudi writers with Qatari newspapers”.

She said that two other Saudi writers, Saleh Al Shehi and Ahmed Bin Rashed Al Saeed, had also stopped writing for Qatari newspapers based on the ministry’s orders.

Another writer, Muhanna Al Hubail, had received similar orders from the ministry, said Mogren.

Meanwhile, Emirati commentators and analysts announced they had quit BeIn Sports, which exclusively broadcasts matches from the English Premier League and the Spanish La Liga to millions of football fans across the Middle East.

Ali Saeed Al Kaabi and Fares Awad announced on Twitter Saturday their resignation from BeIn, without giving any reasons.

Emirati football pundit Sultan Rashed said he would stop contributing to BeIn, while analyst Hassan Al Jassmi said he would no longer appear on both BeIn and Alkass, another Qatari sports channel.

Qatar is a staunch supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, viewed by most conservative monarchies of the Gulf as a threat to their grip on power in their countries because of its grass-roots political advocacy and calls for Islamic governance.

The Gulf Cooperation Council groups Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

CAIRO — Arab foreign ministers on Sunday rejected Israel’s demands that the Palestinians recognise it as a Jewish state, saying such a move would undermine the rights of Palestinian refugees.

In a resolution released at the headquarters of the Arab League in Cairo, the foreign ministers called the issue of Palestinian refugees an integral part of a comprehensive and just peace. It blamed Israel for the floundering of peace negotiations, The Associated Press reported.

The Arab statement offers strong backing to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, who said publicly last week he will never recognise Israel as a Jewish state despite facing strong international pressure. Abbas did not identify who is pressuring him.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week the Palestinians must recognise Israel as a Jewish state to show they are serious about peace. It was the latest sign that despite seven months of mediation efforts by US Secretary of State John Kerry, wide gaps remain between the two sides.

Abbas is due to meet US President Barack Obama in Washington on March 17, as part of US efforts to press both sides. Abbas has said that the Palestine Liberation Organisation recognised the state of Israel in 1993 and that this is sufficient.

The seven-page Arab resolution on the Palestinian issue said it rejects “the demand by Israel and some international parties to identify Israel as a Jewish state, which aims to annul the right of return and compensation for Palestinian refugees”.

It also called for efforts to convene an international conference to address the Palestinian issue, and a re-evaluation of the role of international mediators known as the Quartet, in light of their “failure to make any achievement in realising just and comprehensive peace”.

Arab League chief Nabil El Araby urged Arab countries during the opening session of the meeting to take a “firm stand” against the Israeli demand, calling it a deviation from an agreed-upon framework for peace talks.

“This is a deviation from the international resolutions agreed upon as a basis for the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations, which requires a firm Arab stand to... re-evaluate the negotiation track as a whole, and to strongly express definite Arab rejection of this serious turn,” he told the opening session of the meeting.

The issue is to be followed up at an upcoming Arab leaders’ summit in Kuwait in the final week of March.

Judeh’s remarks

Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh, who led the Kingdom’s delegation to the Arab League meeting, said the Palestinian issue remains the central cause for the Arabs and for Jordan, asserting the Kingdom’s position in support of the Palestinian people in their efforts to translate the two-state solution into reality, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported. 

Under the two-state solution, an independent and sovereign Palestinian state should be set within the pre-1967 lines with East Jerusalem as its capital, under current negotiations, he added.  

The official expressed hope that current US efforts would lead to the setting up of a Palestinian state in a manner that safeguards Jordan’s higher interest, pertaining to key issues, especially the question of the refugees and the fate of Jerusalem. 

Judeh pointed out that Jordan is the largest host country of Palestinian refugees and His Majesty King Abdullah is the custodian of the holy sites in Jerusalem, and has been working to safeguard and preserve the Islamic and Christian sites there, highlighting the historic agreement that was signed between the King and Abbas in March 2013.

Meanwhile, he voiced appreciation for Arab states’ support to Jordan’s successful bid to obtain a non-permanent seat at the UN Security Council for 2014-15 term, stressing that Jordan, during its membership, will work to safeguard Arab interests and defend Arab causes. 

BEIRUT — About a dozen nuns held by rebels in Syria for more than three months have been released and are on their way to Damascus via Lebanon, a security source and church officials said on Sunday.

A Lebanese security source said the nuns had been taken to the Lebanese town of Arsal earlier in the week and were headed to Syria on Sunday accompanied by the head of a Lebanese security agency and a Qatari intelligence official.

The nuns went missing in December after Islamist fighters took the ancient quarter of the Christian town of Maaloula north of Damascus.

After being held in the Greek Orthodox monastery of Mar Thecla in Maaloula, they were reportedly moved to the rebel-held town of Yabroud, about 20km to the north, which is now the focus of a government military operation.

Speaking to reporters at the border, Syrian Greek Orthodox Bishop Louka Al Khoury welcomed the news. “What the Syrian army achieved in Yabroud facilitated this process,” he said.

Shortly after the nuns disappeared, Islamist rebels said they had taken them as their “guests” and that they would release them soon.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group identified the rebels who took the nuns as militants from the Nusra Front, Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria.

The observatory and a rebel source in the area said the release of the nuns had been agreed as part of a swap in which the government would free scores of women prisoners.

“The deal is for the release of 138 women from Assad’s prisons,” the rebel source said, referring to Syrian President Bashar Assad.

In December, the nuns appeared in a video obtained by Al Jazeera television, saying they were in good health, but it was not clear under what conditions the video had been filmed.

Syrian state television devoted significant coverage to the release on Sunday, but made no mention of any prisoner exchange agreement. It broadcast live footage from the Lebanese border and interviews with church officials, including one who denounced the West as only believing “in the dollar”.

A montage of Christian religious imagery including churches, a statue of the Virgin Mary and murals of Jesus was set against dramatic music and described Syria as a “cradle of the monotheistic faiths”.

Syria’s Christian minority has broadly tried to stay on the sidelines of the three-year-old-conflict, which has killed over 140,000 people and which has become increasingly sectarian.

But the rise of hardline Islamists among the overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim opposition has alarmed many. Assad, whose minority Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shiite Islam, has portrayed himself as a bulwark against militant and intolerant ideologies.

TRIPOLI  — Libya’s navy and pro-government militias have dispatched boats to a port held by armed protesters to stop a North Korean-flagged tanker from leaving with crude sold without government permission, officials said on Sunday.

The tanker docked on Saturday at the eastern terminal of Es Sider, one of three ports seized by rebels since August to press demands for autonomy and a bigger share of oil revenue. Local daily Al Wasat said the ship had loaded $36 million of crude.

The rebel oil sale illustrates the deepening turmoil in the OPEC producer, which has failed to rein in fighters who helped oust Muammar Qadhafi in 2011 but who now defy state authority.

In Tripoli, workers at a state oil firm that runs Es Sider port went on strike, urging the government to intervene because their colleagues were under duress from armed protesters.

“We are very angry at what is happening at Es Sider,” said Salah Madari, an oil worker in the capital. “The port’s control officer is being held at gunpoint,” he said, adding that gunmen had also forced a pilot to guide the tanker into dock.

Prime Minister Ali Zeidan said on Saturday the military would bomb the 37,000-tonne Morning Glory if it tried to leave the port, one of Libya’s biggest oil terminals.

There was no sign of any immediate military action. But the navy and allied militias have sent several boats to stop the tanker from leaving, said Culture Minister Habib Al Amin.

He and other government officials did not elaborate at a news conference, but Libyan news websites showed some small boats close to a tanker which they said was the Morning Glory.

“Several navy boats have been dispatched. Now the tanker’s movements are under complete control and nobody can move it,” said Amin, who acts as informal government spokesman. “The tanker will stay where it is.”

“All efforts are being undertaken to stop and seize the tanker, if necessary by a [military] strike, if it does not follow orders,” he said, adding that state prosecutors would treat the loading of the crude as smuggling.

Libya has been trying to rebuild its army since Qadhafi’s overthrow, but analysts say it is not yet a match for battle-hardened militias that fought in the eight-month uprising.

There was no immediate reaction from the protest movement made up of thousands of former state oil guards led by Ibrahim Jathran, who fought Qadhafi troops in 2011 in the east.

The defence ministry earlier issued orders to the chief of staff, air force and navy to deal with the tanker. “The order authorises the use of force and puts the responsibility for any resulting damage on the ship owner,” it said in a statement.

Spokesmen for the state-run National Oil Corp. (NOC) and for the protesters said the tanker was still docked at the port.

A Reuters reporter who visited Es Sider on Saturday evening saw a small number of protesters at the gate. One said their orders were not to let staff out until the loading was complete.

Jathran once led a brigade paid by the state to protect oil facilities. He turned against the government and seized Es Sider and two other eastern ports with thousands of his men in August.

Tripoli has held indirect talks with Jathran, but fears his demand for a greater share of oil revenue for eastern Libya might lead to secession. The region felt disadvantaged under Qadhafi and wants to restore the oil revenue share it received under his predecessor King Idris, who was toppled in 1970.