Five killed in air strike on goverment-backed Libyan hospital

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Five doctors were killed and at least eight medical personnel injured late on Saturday in an air strike on a field hospital run by the internationally recognized Tripoli government, a hospital spokesman said on Sunday.

Libya has been riven by violence since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The eastern Libyan National Army under Khalifa Haftar has been trying to take Tripoli from forces allied to the U.N.-backed Government of National Accord (GNA), but the LNA offensive has bogged down on the capital's outskirts.

The Tripoli government released a statement condemning the incident and accused Haftar's LNA forces of perpetrating the strike. LNA forces were not immediately available for comment.

The hospital provides medical assistance to forces allied to the GNA, hospital spokesman Malek Merset told Reuters.