Russian Mercenaries Leave Various Types Of Mines, Thousands Of Libyan Families Can't Go Home

Illustration of mercenaries in Libya. (Wikimedia Commons/VOA)

JAKARTA - Mercenaries are said to have left various types of explosives mines in Libya when they had to leave the country, preventing citizens from returning to their homes.

Explosives mines are said to have been left by Russian mercenaries, from the streets to houses. Starting from the yard, to dolls and tin bottles.

"Russian mercenaries fled the Libyan capital last summer, leaving houses and yards with mines," said the Libyan mines expert, as reported by Yenisafak from The Independent, Tuesday, June 8.

"They (Russian mercenaries) attached explosives to toilet seats, doors to teddy bears, which are designed to explode when touched," the experts continued.

According to the newspaper, the strangest mine was an empty soft drink can. Because young Libyans love to smash these cans for fun.

"They study us, even how our children play. They know how we think," Rabie al-Jawashi, head of the Free Fields Foundation, a Libyan mine disposal agency, told The Independent.

Illustration of mine decommissioning. (Wikimedia Commons/Petty Officer 2nd Class Patrick Grieco)

According to the newspaper, hundreds, if not thousands of Libyan families were unable to return to their homes because of Russian explosives.

"It's sad to see the world's trash dumped in Libya," said Mohammed Zlateni, leader of a team of mine experts.

"Those responsible are those who support the side (in the Libyan civil war). If there was no outside support, this would not have happened. We Libyans are now paying the price," he growled.

Last summer, the Free Fields team were among the first miners to enter an area under the control of the Russian mercenary Wagner, where the dismantlers found bodybuilding equipment, imported water bottles and cans of formula fortified with explosive mines. inside the house.

Experts also found graffiti on the walls in Russian and Serbian, with instructions on how to open the door and go to the bathroom without setting off the explosives.

"One toilet is designed with a sensor to ignite 9 pounds of TNT when someone sits on it," said the deminers. The deminers also said they found a teddy bear tied to six wires that would explode when someone walked towards it from any direction.

According to the daily, the deminers also found a variety of innovative mines, including Russian 'scattering mines' which self-propagate and self-destruct in 100 hours, antipersonnel mines with laser beams as tripwires and sinister combinations of mines, such as arrangements where one mine is bait and the other explodes.

To note, the civil war in Libya has continued since the overthrow and assassination of the regime of ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. Conditions were exacerbated in 2019, when warlord Khalifa Haftar launched a military offensive to overthrow the internationally recognized government based in Tripoli, for control of the African nation. North of it.

Meanwhile, Libya's new unity government led by Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh was sworn in in March 2021. Along with the inauguration of this government, Russian mercenaries had to leave the country.