Libyan PM accuses Qatar of sending planes with weapons to Tripoli

CAIRO, Egypt: Libyan Prime Minister Abdullah Al-Thinni said on Sunday Qatar had sent three military planes loaded with weapons and ammunition to a Tripoli airport controlled by an armed opposition group.
“Unfortunately they (the planes) reached (Tripoli) Matiga airport,” he told UAE-based Arab TV channel Sky News. “We will consider... breaking off relations if this interference into Libya’s internal affairs continued.”
“We confirm that we have official reports that these war planes carried weapons and ammunition,” he said
Thinni also repeated accusations against Sudan, saying Khartoum had tried sending a military plane loaded with ammunition to Matiga, an airport controlled by an armed opposition group which seized the capital Tripoli last month.
The oil producer is divided between a government and elected parliament, which have relocated to the far east since an armed group from the western city of Misrata took over the capital. The Misrata force has helped set up a rival assembly and government, part of a broader anarchy gripping the country three years after the ousting of Muammar Qaddafi.
“The Sudanese brothers are trying to interfere in Libya’s affairs,” Thinni said.
Sudan has confirmed it had sent a plane to the Libyan airport of Kufra but says it was only carrying equipment for a joint Libyan-Sudanese border force.
Thinni said the Qatari military planes had arrived in Matiga before the Sudanese plane was stopped by Libyan forces in Kufra, a desert town near the Sudanese border.
There was no immediate reaction from Qatar, a Gulf Arab country which has backed the Muslim Brotherhood. Part of the Misrata group controlling Tripoli has links to the Islamist movement.
Analysts say Libya might become a conflict zone for competing regional powers. US officials have said that the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, two countries worried about the spread of radical Islamists in Libya, carried out air strikes against Misrata forces in Tripoli before the armed group conquered the capital.

(Reporting by Omar Fahmy, Ulf Laessing and Feras Bosalum)