UNITED NATIONS: Libya is mired in a constitutional and political stalemate that has sparked increasing clashes, a dire economic situation and demonstrations across the country by frustrated citizens, a senior UN official said Monday.
Assistant Secretary-General Martha Pobee told the UN Security Council the overall situation in Libya remains “highly volatile,” with a tense security situation, “deeply disturbing” shows of force and sporadic violence by militias engaged in political maneuvering.
She also cited a dispute over leadership of the National Oil Corporation and serious human rights concerns, including the reported arrest by armed groups of dozens of protesters who took part in July 1 demonstrations decrying deteriorating living conditions and demanding progress on elections.
Oil-rich Libya has been wracked by conflict since a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. The country was split by rival administrations, one in the east backed by military commander Khalifa Haftar and a UN-supported administration in the capital of Tripoli in the west. Each side is supported by different militias and foreign powers.
In April 2019, Haftar and his forces launched an offensive trying to capture Tripoli. His campaign collapsed after Turkey stepped up its military support for the UN-supported government with hundreds of troops and thousands of Syrian mercenaries.
An October 2020 cease-fire accord led to an agreement on a transitional government in early February 2021 headed by Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah and to the scheduling of elections for last Dec. 24.
But the elections weren’t held. Dbeibah has refused to step down, and in response the country’s east-based lawmakers elected a rival prime minister, Fathy Bashagha, a former interior minister who is now operating a separate administration out of the city of Sirte.
Pobee said a meeting in Geneva last month between the speaker of the country’s east-based parliament, Aguila Saleh, and Khaled Al-Meshri, head of the government’s Supreme Council of State in Tripoli overcame “important contentious points” in a 2017 proposal for a new constitution. But she said they could not agree on one major issue — eligibility requirements for presidential candidates.
The Tripoli-based council insists on banning military personnel as well as dual citizens from running for the country’s top post. That is apparently directed at Haftar, a divisive commander and US citizen who had announced his candidacy for the canceled December election.
Pobee said the UN special adviser on Libya, Stephanie Williams, has remained in contact with both sides “and urged them to bridge this gap.”
At a July 21 meeting of international partners in Istanbul, Williams reiterated that elections are “the only lasting solution that places Libya firmly on the path toward peace and stability,” Pobee said.
Pobee urged council members and Libya’s international partners to use their influence on the rivals to agree on elections as soon as possible.
Libya’s UN ambassador, Taher El Sonni, who represents the Tripoli government, said that “the current situation could get out of hand at any moment unless radical solutions are found away from foreign interventions and political maneuvers.”
He accused the Security Council of doing nothing out of “paralysis” and internal divisions. He urged its members to listen to Libyan protesters “and their overwhelming desire to end this nightmare and get out of this cycle of conflict and never-ending crises.”
The council meeting took place ahead of the July 31 expiration of the mandate for the UN political mission in Libya, which includs a Joint Military Commission monitoring the 2020 cease-fire.
The council’s resolution authorizing the mission called for the withdrawal of all foreign forces and mercenaries from Libya, and Pobee said the monitors plan to meet in Sirte in early August to finalize a proposed plan for their withdrawal.
The council voted April 29 to extend the UN mission for just three months because of Russia’s insistence that it must have a new special representative before it has a longer mandate.
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky, told the council Monday that Moscow recognizes that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is trying to solve the problem. But he said until a candidate satisfies the Libyans, regional players and all council members, the best option is another three month extension for the mission.
UN: Libya is ‘highly volatile’ and elections are needed soon
https://arab.news/zgm46
UN: Libya is ‘highly volatile’ and elections are needed soon
- Oil-rich Libya has been wracked by conflict since a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011
Israel army kills West Bank attacker who tried to run over troops
- The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta”
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said its troops shot dead a man who tried to run over a group of soldiers in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday.
The incident occurred in Einabus in the northern West Bank, the military said.
“A short while ago, a report was received regarding a terrorist who attempted to run over IDF (Israeli army) soldiers operating in the area of Einabus,” the military said.
“In response, the soldiers fired at the terrorist and eliminated him.”
The Palestinian Red Crescent said it rescued three people after the Israeli army opened fire near Einabus on a vehicle with Palestinian license plates.
“Two of the wounded were shot, and one of them is in critical condition. The third was injured as a result of being beaten,” the Red Crescent said.
The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta.”
The incident came just days after a Palestinian from the West Bank ran over an Israeli in his sixties with his vehicle and later stabbed an 18-year-old girl to death in northern Israel.
The perpetrator was killed during the attack.
Following that incident on Friday, the military conducted a two-day operation in the West Bank town of Qabatiya from where the attacker came, detaining several residents including his father and brothers.
Since the start of the war in Gaza following Hamas’s attack on Israel in October 2023, violence has also surged in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.
Israeli troops and settlers have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians in the territory, including many militants as well as dozens of civilians, according to an AFP tally based on figures from the Palestinian health ministry.
According to official Israeli figures, at least 44 Israelis, both soldiers and civilians, have also been killed in Palestinian attacks or Israeli military operations in the same period in the West Bank.
