Tue 7 May 2019:
Photos posted on social media show a bloodied man in military-style clothes without any distinctive badges surrounded by forces said to be loyal to Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar of the Libyan National Army (LNA).
Citing Haftar’s forces that sent her the photos, the Independent’s Middle East correspondent Bel Trew said the man was a “foreign national” from Portugal. While Trew chose to crop out the man’s face, plenty of uncensored photos have emerged elsewhere from the same scene.
Haftar’s Libyan National Army just sent me photos of a plane crash & a foreign national in pilot clothes with head injuries. LNA says few hours ago they shot down his Mirage F1 fighter jet&he is from Portugal. In this photo he is with LNA commander Maj Gen AbdulSalam Hassi #Libya pic.twitter.com/hldjtxdkVI
— Bel Trew (@Beltrew) May 7, 2019
Local sources report the arrest of a Portuguese mercenary whose plane was shot down by Libyan National Army #Libya #Tripoli pic.twitter.com/wAWd6kPtDy
— Vanessa Tomassini (@VanessaTomass) May 7, 2019
The pilot was allegedly captured after his jet was shot down over the Wadi al-Hira area, located south of the Libyan capital of Tripoli. Earlier, there were conflicting reports about his nationality, with some media outlets claiming he was an Italian. The LNA Military Information Division has since claimed he was a “Portuguese mercenary.”
#Libya ??: #LNA forces have shot down a #GNA warplane and claim the pilot they captured is Portuguese(!) pic.twitter.com/L0zYrXkJCw
— Thomas van Linge (@ThomasVLinge) May 7, 2019
Portuguese MPs in the European Parliament have already reacted to the reports. Ana Maria Gomes, an MEP from the Socialist Party, retweeted some of the photos while asking“which forces the Portuguese man is serving?”
Reports say the captured pilot was flying a French-designed Dassault Mirage F1 jet. Libyan forces had 38 of the jets since the late 1970s, and France agreed to modernize the remaining fleet in 2012 after the NATO-backed war toppled Colonel Muammar Gaddafi and threw the country into civil war chaos.
-Source: RT
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