CAPITAL, PARIS -               France confirmed it has bought the Javelin missiles found in a captured Libyan National Army base last month from the United States.

The French military on Wednesday, said the projectiles were unusable and never meant for sale or transfer to any party in the Libyan conflict.

The missiles according to report were for the “self-protection of a French military unit deployed to carry out counterterrorism operations,” the Army Ministry said in a statement.

“Damaged and unusable, the armaments were being temporarily stocked at a depot ahead of their destruction,” the ministry said.

The New York Times reported that the cache of four Javelin anti-tank missiles were found by militias fighting with the Libyan government in Tripoli against the Libyan National Army, which launched an offensive to capture the capital in April.

The militias reportedly found the Javelin missiles in a camp near Gharyan, in the mountains 80 kilometres south of Tripoli, after they recaptured the former key supply route for the LNA.

In April, Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar launched an offensive on Tripoli, vowing to cleanse the capital of the powerful militias that prop up the UN-backed government. The LNA already controls much of Libya’s east and south.

Field Marshal Haftar, who in recent years has battled extremists and other militias across eastern Libya, says he is determined to restore stability to the country.

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