Libya magnet for jihadists from Tunisia and beyond

Tripoli

Lawless Libya has become a magnet for radical militants who receive weapons training in jihadist camps before launching deadly attacks in other countries, like last week's beach massacre in Tunisia.

The oil-rich North African country bordering Tunisia has rival governments and parliaments as well as a slew of armed groups vying for power in the aftermath of its 2011 uprising that toppled dictator Moamer Kadhafi.

The chaos in Libya has "serious security implications for the region", said Michael Nayebi-Oskoui, senior Middle East analyst at Stratfor, a global intelligence and advisory firm based in the US city of Texas.

Libya has witnessed "a small but steady return of fighters" from the conflict in Syria, he said. Tunis says 3,000 of its citizens are fighting alongside jihadist groups in Syria, Iraq and Libya, and that 500 battle-hardened veterans have returned home where they pose a security threat.

On June 26, a student armed with an assault rifle mowed down 38 tourists at Tunisia's popular Port el Kantaoui beach resort, the second deadly attack on holidaymakers in three months in Tunisia. Authorities identified the gunman as 23-year-old Tunisian student Seifeddine Rezgui and said he had received weapons training from jihadists in Libya.

He was said to have been in Libya at the same time as the two gunmen who in March attacked the National Bardo Museum in Tunis, killing 21 tourists and a policeman. "It is confirmed that he went to Libya illegally. He was trained in Sabratha," west of Tripoli, said Tunisia's secretary of state for security, Rafik Chelli.

He said the Bardo assailants were out of Tunisia at the same time and had trained with Ansar al-Sharia, an Al-Qaeda-linked group classified as a terrorist organisation by Washington and the UN.