Attorney general asked to investigate amid allegations warnings ignored about dangerous state of two dams
Libya’s attorney general has been asked by senior politicians to launch an urgent inquiry into the catastrophic floods that have killedof people, including into allegations local officials imposed a curfew on the night Storm Daniel struck.
Many have been buried in mass graves but one of the chief shortages in the city, apart from drinking water, is body bags required to prevent disease spreading from unburied bodies. Rescue teams have been able to enter the city and are scouring rubble and ruins left by the floods. A Turkish firm, Arsel, had been contracted to work on the dams in 2007 but left Libya in 2011 when fighting broke out and had not returned. Part of a sum of 39m dinars set aside for the dam’s maintenance in 2003 was later taken back from the ministry of water resources. After the company left the country, its machinery was stolen and the building site went into disuse, according to information that was shared with Dabaiba at a meeting with the ministry.
Derna citizens had been very aware of the threat posed by the state of the dams and the Wadi Derna River that runs through the city with no embankment.Accusations are being made that officials from the Libyan National Army security directorate may be trying to cover up that as Storm Daniel hit on Sunday night its officials went on TV to instruct citizens to stay in their homes under curfew rather than evacuate.
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