Benghazi (Reuters): The bodies of 10 men who appear to have been tortured and shot dead have been found in a suburb of Libya’s eastern city of Benghazi, a security official said.

The bodies were found overnight between Thursday and Friday in Benghazi’s Shabna district, said Milad Al Zwai, a spokesman for Benghazi’s special forces.

For the past two years Benghazi has been the site of a military campaign led by eastern commander Khalifa Haftar against Islamists and other opponents.

After long struggling to make progress, Haftar’s forces seized several key neighbourhoods earlier this year, though they still have not brought the city under full control.

It was not clear who was responsible for the killings. Only five of the bodies found in Shabna had been identified, but Zwai did not give details.

The area is under the control of Haftar’s forces.

In July, 14 bodies with gunshot wounds to the head were found in another Benghazi neighbourhood, Laithi, which had been the scene of fierce fighting before Haftar’s forces took control of it several months earlier.