Ankara (Web Desk): Libya’s top military commander, Chief of Staff Mohammed Ali Ahmed Al-Haddad, died on Tuesday when the aircraft carrying him crashed shortly after departing from Turkiy’es capital, Ankara, according to Libya's internationally recognised prime minister.
Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah, in a statement mourning the loss, said the accident occurred as the delegation was returning from an official visit to Ankara, calling it a heartbreaking tragedy for the nation. He described Al-Haddad’s death as a profound blow to Libya, its armed forces and the wider public.
Dbeibah said four other people were also travelling on the jet at the time of the crash. They included the commander of Libya’s ground forces, the head of the military manufacturing authority, an adviser to the chief of staff and a photographer attached to his office.
Providing details from the Turkish side, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said the plane departed Ankara’s Esenboga Airport at around 1710 GMT with Tripoli as its destination. He said contact with the aircraft was lost about 40 minutes later, at 1752 GMT. Search and rescue teams later located the wreckage near the village of Kesikkavak in the Haymana district of Ankara province.
Yerlikaya said the Dassault Falcon 50 aircraft had issued a request for an emergency landing while flying over the Haymana area, but communication was abruptly cut off and could not be restored. The cause of the crash has yet to be determined.
Turkey’s defence ministry had earlier announced Al-Haddad’s visit, noting that he held talks in Ankara with Turkish Defence Minister Yasar Guler, Selcuk Bayraktaroglu and other senior Turkish military officials.
The fatal incident occurred just a day after Turkey’s parliament voted to extend the mandate for the deployment of Turkish troops in Libya by a further two years.
Turkey, a member of NATO, has been a key political and military supporter of Libya’s Tripoli-based government, dispatching military personnel in 2020 to assist with training and support.
Relations between Ankara and Tripoli have also produced agreements that have drawn regional opposition. In 2020, both sides signed a maritime boundary deal disputed by Egypt and Greece, followed in 2022 by a preliminary agreement on energy exploration, which those two countries have also opposed.