From 1 October to 31 October 2017, the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) documented 38 civilian casualties - 23 deaths and 15 injuries – during the conduct of hostilities across Libya. Victims included 11 men killed and seven injured, three women killed and three injured, and nine children killed (six boys and three girls) and five injured (three girls and two boys).
The majority of civilian casualties were caused by airstrikes (12 deaths and seven injuries), and the rest by explosive remnants of war (ERW, six deaths and seven injuries) and gunfire (five deaths and one injury).
UNSMIL documented civilian casualties in Benghazi (seven deaths, seven injuries), Derna (seven deaths, seven injuries), Kufra (one injury), Misrata (two deaths), Sidi al-Saeh (Tarhouna, one injury) and Tripoli (one death), as detailed below.
Civilian Casualty Incidents
On 4 October, an attack on the Misrata Court Complex claimed by the so-called Islamic State (IS), involving the use of explosives and direct gunfire, killed two civilian men and two security personnel, in addition to the three perpetrators. The two civilian men were shot dead. Another 41 men were injured in the attack, but UNSMIL has not been able to ascertain their civilian status.
On 6 October, in Kufra, the body of a Tebu man was found bearing gunshot wounds. The man, who suffers from a mental illness and went missing the day before his body was found, is reported to have inadvertently crossed the “division line” separating the Tebu areas from the Zway areas established following armed clashes between the two communities in recent years.
Between 16 and 22 October, in Triopoli, during the armed clashes in al-Ghrarat area, an 81-year-old Sufi imam was killed by gunfire. The clashes were between the Special Deterrence Force (SDF) armed group and members of the al-Mungar family, who were allegedly involved in drug smuggling. The victim was unrelated to the al-Mungar family. Other casualties were reported during the clashes in al-Ghrarat, but UNSMIL was unable to ascertain their civilian status.
On 21 October, in Sidi al-Saeh, a Tawerghan woman IDP sustained multiple gunshot wounds to her legs and shoulder during an attack on the IDP camp by the al-Kani armed group.
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