A U.S. citizen and teacher at an international school in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi was killed by unidentified assailants on Thursday, security officials told Xinhua.

Joint Security Room in Benghazi Spokesperson Ibrahim Sharaa told Xinhua that the U.S. expatriate was killed on Thursday morning as he was jogging on Venice Street near the headquarters of the U.S. consulate which had been attacked last year.

The victim is identified as Ronnie Smith, a Texan, born in 1980. He taught chemistry at the city's international school, a Libyan-owned institute that follows an American curriculum.

No one has claimed responsibility for the teacher's killing but Islamic militants have been active in the city.

The spokesperson of Jalaa Hospital in Benghazi told Xinhua: " We received the body in the morning. His death was caused by direct gunfire".

Also on Thursday morning, a young cadet and a member of the special forces also were killed by gunshots in the head in two separate incidents.

Army cadet Salah al-Warfalli was shot in the head in Benghazi' s Selmanhi district and special forces member Ahmed Tarhouni was killed in the al-Salam area of the city near a local car market.

During the past two weeks, Benghazi has been witnessing a new wave of violence that resulted from earlier clashes between the militia of Ansar al-Sharia and the Libyan army, which claimed nine lives and left more than 50 injured.

On Tuesday, the interim government announced the formation of a ministerial committee to enforce the ban on militias in Benghazi, the official government website reported.

For over a year, the security situation in Benghazi as well as in the entire Cyrenaica region has drastically deteriorated as Islamic fundamentalist militias threaten the stability and the establishment of state security forces.