Mercenaries flee fighting in Libya through bribes

Around 95 Turkish-backed mercenaries in Libya have returned to Syria over the past few hours. To compensate for the return of mercenaries from Libya, nearly 200 fighters belonging to factions loyal to Turkey were secretly transferred from Syrian to Libyan territories.

The fighters allegedly paid $500 each to doctors in Libya to write reports stating that their health condition was deteriorating. They then gave the reports to their leaders who permitted their return. They stopped over in Turkey first, before returning to Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights "SOHR" said.

The observatory said fighters who returned received only a quarter of their agreed monthly salaries, receiving $500 instead of their promised $2,000 a month, with some claiming they have not received their wages for more than five months.

A few days ago, SOHR sources reported that discontent was growing as Turkish-backed factions’ leaders continued defrauding their members, by cutting a large part of the members’ monthly salaries, as well as delaying payments.

It is worth noting that the number of recruits who arrived in Libya approximated 18,000 Syrian mercenaries, including 350 children under the age of 18, of whom 10,750 returned to Syria after completing the duration of their contracts and receiving their financial dues. While the number of jihadists who were transported from Syria to Libya reached 10,000, of whom there were 2,500 Tunisians. 

It is also worth noting that the number of fatalities among the Turkish-backed Syrian factions in Libya reached 496.

Hundreds of mercenaries are fighting in Libya, where the Turkey-backed Government of National Accord in the capital Tripoli has been locked in a nine-year conflict with Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army in the east.