A group of 146 asylum-seekers have arrived in Italy as part of a U.N.-backed humanitarian evacuation from Libya.
The U.N. refugee agency says it's the fifth such evacuation since 2017, though previous airlifts have taken migrants to Niger and elsewhere.
The group arrived Monday at a Rome military base. Dozens of the asylum-seekers are minors, many of whom are unaccompanied. They hail from Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Ethiopia.
Under anti-migrant Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, Italy has essentially closed its ports to migrants fleeing Libya aboard smugglers boats.
Salvini's deputy, Stefano Candiani, said Monday that such evacuations, in which the U.N. screens asylum-seekers in situ, are the way people deserving of protection should arrive in Europe.
The evacuation comes as officials reported Monday that Libyan forces loyal to a former military commander have intensified their airstrikes on Tripoli, where heavy fighting and blocked roads have left civilians trapped in their homes.
Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter's self-styled Libyan National Army launched an operation to retake the capital on April 4 and has been locked in heavy fighting in and around the city with militias loosely allied with a U.N.-supported government. The clashes have killed at least 345 people, including 22 civilians, according to the latest U.N. figures released last on Sunday.
Libyan officials said LNA airstrikes have targeted the Nawasi Brigade in the Abu Salim district, about 7 kilometers (4 miles) from Tripoli's center. At least four civilians were killed, they said.
They said airstrikes hit al-Qaqaa military camp in the town of al-Falah, south of Tripoli. The camp is controlled by powerful militias from the western town of Misrata that are also allied with the Tripoli government. Airstrikes and shelling also hit the towns of Khallet al-Forjan, Ain Zara and al-Twaisha, south of the capital, and heavy fighting was underway in Salah al-Deen, an area that saw earlier clashes between rival militias in September.
