The force defending oil ports in eastern Libya pushed back an onslaught that Islamist militias had started 11 days ago to capture the facilities. “We pushed them back and it’s we who are now attacking them,” Ali al-Hasy, a spokesman of the Petroleum Facilities Guard, said by phone from Es Sider, Libya’s largest oil port. “The oil ports are safe and they suffered no damage. All the fighting took place well outside the ports.” The Tripoli-based Libyan News Agency today reported the death of Tareq Shnena, the commander of the Islamist force tasked with capturing the eastern oil ports. He succumbed to wounds sustained in the fighting near Es Sider, it said, without saying where it got the information. State-run National Oil Corp. on Dec. 13 declared force majeure in Es Sider and the neighboring Ras Lanuf oil port, Libya’s third-largest. The move came after the Islamist-backed, self-proclaimed government […]