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- Oct 21, 2010
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Parliamentarians voted to oust Zeidan as anger grew with the government's failure to stop eastern rebels from independently exporting oil.
The vote on Tuesday came hours after an oil tanker carrying rebel oil escaped warships and left the country.
MP Suleiman al-Zubi told the AFP news agency that Defence Minister Abdullah al-Thinni was named interim premier for the two weeks the assembly now has to agree on a permanent replacement.
"The Congress voted to withdraw its confidence in the prime minister by 124 votes," al-Zubi told AFP.
Previous attempts to bring down Zeidan had failed to win the required majority of 120 of the assembly's 194 members.
Zeidan's government had been repeatedly criticised for its failure to disarm militias which have carved out their own fiefdoms since the NATO-backed uprising that ended the 42-year rule of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
The prime minister was himself briefly abducted by an armed group in the heart of the capital, Tripoli, last October.
Rebels demanding a bigger share of oil revenue and political autonomy in the east seized three ports last summer and partly control a fourth.
The central government had threatened armed action, even an air strike, to prevent the North Korean-flagged tanker, which docked in al-Sidra port on Saturday, from getting away with its cargo.
The vessel is reported to have taken on at least 234,000 barrels of crude. It was intercepted by the navy on Sunday, but managed to slip into international waters a day later.
Source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/