Militants' bodies left to rot for years, in symbol of Libya's disarray

Food refrigerated containers, that hold corpses of alleged Islamic State fighters, are pictured in Kararim, near Misrata, Libya January 4, 2022. Libyan Criminal Investigation Bureau/Handout via REUTERS

MISRATA, Libya (Reuters) - Hundreds of bodies of Islamic State fighters killed in battle years ago are rotting in food freezers outside a Libyan city while authorities work out what to do with them, a grim reminder of the disarray a failed election was meant to address.

Stored in a dusty corner of a compound southeast of Misrata, the 742 bodies were gathered by the internationally recognised government in 2016 from battlefields and informal graves, but there was no agreement on how or where they should be buried.