Libya's Benghazi airport reopens after three-year hiatus

Benghazi's international airport has officially reopened for commercial flights amid a heavy security presence after a three-year closure due to fighting in the city.

According to Reuters, the first outward bound flights from Benina Airport on Saturday were to the capital, Tripoli, to Amman, Jordan, and to the south-eastern Libyan city of Kufra.

Other flights are also scheduled to and from Tunis, Istanbul, Alexandria, and the western Libyan city of Zintan.

The flights are operated by two state-owned companies, Libyan Airlines and Afriqiyah Airways.

Benina is just east of Benghazi, Libya's second city, where fighting escalated in the summer of 2014 when forces loyal to eastern-based commander Khalifa Haftar launched a military campaign against Islamist militias and other opponents.

Travelers and airport staff expressed relief at no longer having to travel to Labraq airport, a four-hour drive east of Benghazi, which had replaced Benina as the main airport for the eastern part of the country.

In recent months, some official and cargo flights had already been flying from Benina, which also hosts a military airport that continued operating throughout the conflict as Haftar's forces targeted their rivals with airstrikes.

Tripoli's international airport was badly damaged by fighting in 2014, and flights have since operated out of the smaller Mitiga airport near the centre of the capital.

Earlier this month, Haftar announced the "total liberation" of Benghazi after his forces battled rivals in their last downtown holdouts.

"After a continuous struggle against terrorism and its agents that lasted more than three years... we announce to you the liberation of Benghazi from terrorism," he said in a speech at the time.

"Today, Benghazi enters a new era of peace, security, reconciliation... and reconstruction," said Haftar.

He paid homage to "a caravan of martyrs" who fell to control the city.

Libya descended into chaos following the 2011 civil war that toppled and killed dictator Moammar Gaddafi. The oil-rich nation is now split between rival governments and militias.