It’s in the last paragraph, and I saw the same thing on a newspaper in Lebanon, but no coverage anywhere else.
Somehow, the Libyan rebel movement headed by Moamar Qaddafi was able to take over the village of Qatrun from the forces loyal to the government of Libya in Benghazi. 140 4×4 trucks showed up in the desert out of nowhere.
The town consists of one filling station about 150 miles north of the border with Niger. It’s in the general area of the oil and gas fields in the Southern Sahara desert of Southwest Libya and probably a point at which water from the ManMade river to Benghazi could be turned off.
The accounts don’t say, but given the geography, it’s likely the “Pro-Qadaffi” forces came in from over the Niger border. It might be a mistake on AFP’s part to assume they are loyal to Tripoli – but created a binary “us/them” narrative keeps things simple for the readers. They might just be the first probe by Niger, Chad and/or Sudan to see how weak Libya’s defenses are to repel an invasion from subsaharan Africa.