Tim Eaton
Introduction
Libya’s struggles in the decade following the uprisings that led to the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi are well known. At the national level, two major further outbreaks of conflict – in 2014, leading to a governance split and the emergence of rival authorities in the east and west of the country, and in 2019–20 as Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF) sought to capture Tripoli – underscored the challenges of securing a transition to more stable government. But violence has also been localized, most notably in the bloody battle for control of Benghazi, but also in other areas of the country, from Kufra in the southeast to Ubari and Sebha in the southwest. Turf wars among rivals in major cities have continued, with events in Tripoli dominating international news coverage.
Libyan armed groups have been singled out as the key impediment to conflict resolution, but it would be a mistake to divorce them from their local context. Perhaps 25,000 Libyans participated in the civil war of 2011, yet the number of those armed subsequently swelled. A decade later, the number of armed security personnel was thought to exceed 400,000, although the true number of Libyans who are currently either members or auxiliaries of armed groups is unclear.
Defining the actors and groups within this armed landscape is challenging. Most armed groups are formally affiliated to the Libyan state but in reality are not subject to the authority of the state’s formal chain of command, with the result that many operate with significant autonomy. More widely, it should be noted that the formal elements of the Libyan state – i.e. its formal institutions – are controlled by an array of competing actors and their extended social networks.
This means that the Libyan state cannot be considered a unitary actor, and indicates why the policies of formal state institutions tend to reflect the parochial interests of the networks that control the institutions, rather than the broader national interests of the state.
Relations between holders of executive office and these groups lean heavily on interpersonal connections rather than institutionalized systems and processes. This blurring of lines makes the distinction between ‘state’ and ‘non-state’ actors – which is of particular interest for anyone seeking to reform the security sector by empowering the former against the latter – problematic.
Libya’s security sector has thus come to be described as ‘hybrid’, because its armed actors have one foot inside and one outside the state’s formal structures. The term ‘hybrid’ helps to convey some of the complexity of Libyan armed groups’ networks and interactions. However, it also brings compromise: by accepting these organizations as operating in both state and non-state areas, a somewhat arbitrary separation of the formal state from the rest of society is created. This creates a false binary division in parts of the Middle East and North Africa where a multiplicity of actors enjoy state power.
Libya is one such context, as a close study of armed groups in Misrata, Zawiya and Zintan illustrates. Moreover, one of the aims of this research paper is to move away from understandings of Libyan armed groups primarily based on their formal – or lack of – state affiliation.
This paper explores the nature of Libya’s security sector through comparison of three local contexts, presenting case studies on Misrata, Zawiya and Zintan. While the security sector can be seen to ‘broadly comprise all institutions and other entities with a role in ensuring the security of the state and its people’, the analysis focuses specifically, in each of the cities studied, on the social networks of the armed groups that have some role in providing direct security functions in their city.
It is not the aim of the paper to redefine complex localized security environments in Libya, but rather to focus on the nature of their development. Moreover, expanding the analysis to cover a wide array of state institutions would have been too broad a scope of enquiry. Thus, for each of the case study locations, the paper will reference the security apparatus and the armed groups that apparatus comprises.
While political actors’ pursuit of self-interest has been much criticized as having contributed to Libya’s post-2011 failures, armed groups have been singled out in particular. Their growing presence across all aspects of Libyan life, their engagement in economic, and often criminal, enterprise, their penetration of state institutions and in a number of instances their widespread violations of human rights have led many to argue that the armed groups are the key block to a more accountable system of government. Discussion of the vested interests of ‘militias’ is widespread.
Armed groups have significantly increased their power and influence since 2011. They have affiliated themselves with the state, obtaining access to salaries – perhaps as much as LYD15 billion in 2022 (equivalent to some $3.15 billion)– and other sources of revenue without becoming accountable to it. Rather than the state integrating the armed groups, the latter have integrated the state’s own forces into their structures. And the ambitions of Libya’s armed groups are growing. In 2023, for instance, the acting interior minister of the Government of National Unity (GNU) and the interior minister of the rival Government of National Stability (GNS) have risen to prominence on the basis of their ties to armed groups.
Armed groups have also consolidated their power on the ground. In key cities such as Tripoli and Zawiya, they have developed into powerful blocs, with smaller actors either subsumed within them or forced out. Moreover, armed groups are increasingly involved in the negotiation of political deals, and have set up direct lines of communication with one another despite the ongoing competition among them. Political agreements are unlikely to endure without the acquiescence of armed group leaders. Should elections be held, armed groups are likely to be directly represented in the legislature.
Nonetheless, it would be a mistake to entirely divorce armed groups from their social context. With some notable exceptions, Libyan armed groups predominantly operate in the areas where they originated, giving them a distinctly local character.
This ensures a degree of social accountability that should not be underestimated – even if this varies from location to location, and a group’s constituency may comprise only a limited subset of the community. This local factor is critical to understanding the Libyan security sector, yet it has been relatively underexplored. In so doing, this research paper builds on previous work for Chatham House that has sought to understand post-2011 armed groups in Libya as extended social networks.
Drawing on a wide range of key informant interviews of individuals with close knowledge of the security landscape conducted between January 2021 and March 2023, and 28 in-depth interviews with residents of the three cities, this paper seeks to address this gap through study of the development of the security apparatuses of Misrata, Zawiya and Zintan.
The paper has been developed from the author’s research with a group of Libyan researchers, including Mohamed Abdusammee, Mohamed al-Gurj, Asma Khalifa, Mohamed Lagha and Ahmed Shalghoum, without whose contribution this paper would not have been possible. Other researchers have preferred to remain anonymous. All of the analysis, and any errors, are the responsibility of the author alone.
The study reveals that the security sector in each location has developed in accordance with distinctly local dynamics: the social composition of the area; the experience of conflict in the location; the structure of the local economy and economic opportunity; and relations with neighbouring areas and the state’s formal institutions.
Drawing on the analysis, the paper goes on to explore the implications for the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) of armed groups in the three locations studied, and across Libya more widely. It should be noted, however, that the paper stops short of seeking to articulate any detailed form of programmatic DDR strategy, acknowledging that such work requires sustained engagement with experts in the DDR field, Libyan and international policymakers.
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Tim Eaton – Senior Research Fellow, Middle East and North Africa Programme.
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