Tripoli, May 4 (IANS) At least nine soldiers were killed as a terrorist attack on Saturday targeted an Army training centre in the Libyan city of Sabha, officials said.

"Terrorists launched an attack at 5 a.m. (local time) on the training centre of the Army in Sabha. The attackers used vehicles and opened fire at the soldiers," a military official was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency.

He added that the Islamic State was likely to be behind the attack.

Osama al-Wafi, spokesman of Sabha medical centre, said they received nine bodies of the soldiers killed in the attack.

Sabha, southern Libya's largest city, has been under the control of the east-based Army since January.

Libya has been suffering escalating violence and political division ever since the fall of the late leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

--IANS soni/