Luis Aleman, Bryan Dawson and Nii Simmonds

By intensifying its involvement in Libya, China not only aims to secure its access to vital oil resources but also to establish a strategic foothold that could facilitate its expansion into Central Africa.

The collaboration between Libya’s GNA and China underscores the GNA’s efforts to engage with global powers to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure and stabilize its economy amidst ongoing internal and external challenges. However, the GNA’s endeavors to assert its authority and manage the country effectively were persistently undermined by the fragmented political landscape and security issues.

This backdrop of political strife and the GNA’s quest for international partnerships highlight the complex dynamics of governance and international relations in Libya’s quest for stability and prosperity.

Beyond energy security, China sees an opportunity to expand its geopolitical influence in Africa and counterbalance Western powers in the region, such as the United States and France. Libya’s strategic location in North Africa offers access to growing markets, and, as Libya rebuilds, opportunities to secure lucrative infrastructure, construction, and other contracts.

Despite these opportunities, China faces challenges. In addition to the United States and France, other international players, such as Russia and Turkey, are vying for influence and contracts in Libya.

Anti-Chinese sentiment remain common in Libya, reflecting Libyans’ memory of China’s pro-Gaddafi stance and alleged supplying of arms to pro-Gaddafi forces in 2011. These sentiments and the perception that Chinese companies are exploiting Libya’s resources and labor add to the challenge. However, economic interests, geopolitical ambitions, and the BRI will continue to drive China’s engagement in the country.

Addressing migration: A challenge for Europe

Libya’s influx of migrants has emerged as a formidable challenge for Europe. Situated at the crossroads of Africa and Europe, Libya stands as a primary transit point for migrants seeking refuge across European shores.

Fleeing from war or famine, migrants find themselves ensnared within Libya’s borders, stripped of basic rights. The plight faced by migrants highlights the pressing need to address this complex issue with compassion and urgency to prevent further suffering and loss of life.

Additionally, the European Union’s focus on border control and the interception of refugees at sea has led to severe humanitarian consequences. Over 82,000 people have been forcibly returned to Libya in the past five years, where they face dire conditions that include torture and sexual violence.

This situation poses a moral and political dilemma for Europe. Balancing the management of migration flows with human rights obligations is a complex task. Europe must recalibrate its strategy, prioritizing safe and legal migration pathways and reassessing support for operations that contribute to human rights abuses. The EU’s responsibility extends beyond its borders, demanding a policy shift that places human dignity at its core.

A catalyst for change: Empowering Libya’s diaspora

Libya’s people are scattered worldwide. It is crucial for Libyan policymakers to engage with the diaspora to tap into their skills and utilize them for the progress of the country. Yet, the level of their impact depends on international support.

Unfortunately, economic struggles, especially the liquidity crisis, have hindered the ability of Libyans living abroad to send financial aid to their families, which also affects regional economic stability. Acknowledging the diaspora as a valuable source of talent and assets is essential for rebuilding and growing Libya.

The Libyan diaspora makes up a significant part of the population, possessing valuable skills, expertise, and cross-cultural competencies acquired through time spent overseas. By utilizing this resource, Libya can gain diverse viewpoints and innovative ideas that have been honed around the world.

To effectively involve the diaspora in rebuilding their country, it is necessary to tackle underlying economic problems that are plaguing Libya. Investing in infrastructure development will not only improve connectivity within cities but also establish transportation links connecting urban centers with remote regions.

This connected network will unite communities and promote inclusivity among all Libyans, regardless of their location.

Additionally, in the pursuit of a stable Libya emerging from its delicate state, it is crucial to harness the potential of the diaspora with expertise in governance, accountability, and transparency.

Libyans could greatly benefit from leveraging this resource by engaging individuals with extensive knowledge of effective governance practices acquired through experiences in various international settings.

By tapping into their diverse skillsets, which encompasses areas such as policy development, institutional design, and organizational leadership, the diaspora can contribute towards building robust institutions that prioritize accountability and transparency within Libya’s governmental framework.

Through collaboration between overseas professionals and local counterparts, this partnership could foster innovative solutions to address pressing issues while nurturing an environment conducive to sustainable growth and stability for Libya.

The way forward

As we envisage Libya’s path forward, the 6+6 agreement emerges as a cornerstone of hope and unity, bridging the divide between the East and the West. Integral to this transformation, and deserving of special recognition, is the Libyan diaspora.

The diaspora’s role extends beyond mere consultation. They are instrumental in driving economic development, promoting cultural exchange, and aiding in the establishment of a global network that supports Libya’s aspirations.

Their engagement is vital in ensuring that the implementation of the 6+6 agreement is not only successful but also inclusive, reflecting the rich tapestry of the Libyan identity. The 6+6 agreement offers a collective call to action for all Libyans, both within the country and across the globe, to embrace this historic opportunity for change.

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Wolfram Lacher

Western governments have castigated Russia and Turkey for destabilizing Libya with their military deployments. But in daily life, their military presence is hardly noticeable – even in the immediate vicinity of their bases.

In this Megatrends Afrika Spotlight, Wolfram Lacher (SWP) argues that both states have adopted a low profile in order to stay in Libya for the long term – and so far, their approach appears to be working.

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On successive visits to Tripoli over the past two years, I repeatedly drove to a military base on the capital’s western outskirts for meetings. The base is located in a dead end that is set back a few hundred metres from the coastal road. To reach it, I would first pass by another compound just next to it, called Sidi Bilal – one of several bases hosting Syrian fighters whom Turkey has been deploying to western Libya since 2020.

On my first visits, the Turkish flag fluttering at the top of a mast inside the base was clearly visible from outside the base’s walls. Syrian fighters would keep a wary eye on me as I drove past. But on my last two visits, in late 2023 and mid-2024, the flag had been lowered so that it was no longer visible from beyond the walls. I could only catch a glimpse of a Syrian guard’s face peering out from a narrow gap in the gate. It was obvious that measures had been taken to make the Syrians’ presence as discreet as possible.

These changes reflect a broader pattern of how both Turkey and Russia have adapted their military deployments in Libya to the local political context while settling in for the long term. After initial episodes illustrated the explosive potential of troops having contact with local society, both states and their proxies have made their presence increasingly invisible and progressively reduced their interactions in the environments surrounding their bases. For now, this strategy appears to have been by and large successful in gaining a modicum of acceptance for the foreign military presence and thwarting attempts to politicize it.

Settling In

Led by the United States (US), Western states frequently point to the Russians’ presence as destabilizing Libya. Except for France, they rarely portray the Turkish deployment in similarly negative terms. Calls for all foreign forces to withdraw have become a routine talking point of Western states concerning Libya.

In fact, the balance of power created by Russia’s and Turkey’s military presence has been instrumental in freezing the Libyan conflict since the defeat of Khalifa Haftar’s offensive on Tripoli in June 2020. Both states gained their military foothold during that conflict after Western governments adopted a hands-off approach to Haftar’s offensive, with the US and France deciding to give war a chance. Since the end of that conflict, Haftar has relied on Russia – initially under the guise of the Wagner Group – to deter social unrest and protect him from potential attacks by his opponents based in western Libya.

The latter, in turn, have relied on Turkey to prevent another offensive by Haftar. Both sides have paid their foreign backers for their assistance, allowing them to build a permanent presence in Libya at little cost. Western states, having already proven to Libya’s rival factions that they could not be relied upon, have been short of practical ideas for how to make their recurrent calls for foreign forces to leave a reality.

When both states first began intervening in 2019, their irruption into Libya was a striking illustration of how rapidly the international order was changing – and it heralded new patterns of foreign intervention in African conflicts. It also startled Libyans and observers of the Libyan conflict. Both Russia and Haftar’s forces denied that they had deployed the Wagner Group – which, at the time, did not officially exist. Visual evidence of Wagner’s presence first came in the form of documents and photos captured by Haftar’s enemies on the battlefield.

Turkey, by contrast, officially announced its intervention, but its deployment of Syrian fighters in December 2019 embarrassed the anti-Haftar forces. Whereas the latter kept quiet about the mercenaries and restricted journalists’ access to them, the Syrians shared videos of their first battles. When the Turkish intervention finally forced Wagner into a hurried retreat, the Russian’s stealth intervention was briefly caught in the spotlight. Images of Russian fighters being evacuated through the streets of a western Libyan town on uncovered trucks in broad daylight stunned Libyan social media.

Becoming Invisible

When the war ended but the foreign forces remained, early events appeared to underline the explosive potential of the foreign military presence. In Sirte, near the new frontline, Wagner terrorized the population by shelling a residential area to forcibly displace its inhabitants before occupying their houses and mining the surroundings, thereby potentially killing anyone who might approach the area. In Misrata, Syrian fighters occupied the houses of displaced residents in a southern suburb, fuelling latent tensions with neighbours. When protests erupted in Tripoli in August 2020 amid an economic crisis and defunct public services, those protesting expressed anger that Syrian fighters were being paid in precious US dollars, whereas Libyans barely received their public-sector dinar salaries.

As rivalries among Haftar’s western Libyan adversaries resurfaced, some sought to damage their opponents by falsely accusing them of using Syrian fighters in local conflicts. Pro-Haftar propagandists, meanwhile, tried to stoke fear and anger by spreading fabricated stories of Syrian fighters abducting Libyan women.

The foreign presence seemed all the more likely to provoke a backlash, as contact between foreign forces and the local population was not uncommon, and largely unregulated. In Sirte and Jufra, Russians frequently turned up in shops and restaurants, at times openly carrying weapons. Sudanese fighters, whom Haftar was no longer able to pay, became an even more vexing presence, as they began demanding tolls at checkpoints along overland roads, and as their ventures into fuel smuggling caused shortages for Libyan consumers. In Tripoli, Syrians also regularly ventured out of their bases on foot to shop for groceries, and in August 2021 they openly protested in front of a base about delayed salaries.

Since then, however, the Turkish, Syrian, and Russian presence has gradually become largely invisible. In Sirte, Wagner fighters withdrew from the areas they had occupied to a dedicated area in the Qardhabiya airbase in 2021. Their visits to local shops in Sirte and Jufra, often together with their Syrian translators, have become much less frequent. On the rare occasions that they do appear in public, they now invariably wear civilian clothing, signalling that they are on their day off.

In the southern bases of Brak and Tamanhant, where the Russians also have a presence, it is even less common to encounter them outside the bases, local residents say. Interlocutors from the far south occasionally report hearing about Russian visits to remote sites such as gold mining areas or military bases, but they rarely describe seeing them with their own eyes.

Much of the same goes for the Syrian fighters deployed by Turkey. In Suq al-Khamis, south of Tripoli, residents had complained that Syrian fighters would often come out of a local base on foot. But for the past year at least, their sorties were restricted to a single weekly trip by car to local shops, suggesting that a regime regulating interactions with locals had been introduced – thus turning boredom into a major challenge for the Syrians.

The formal Turkish military presence itself has been even less visible, confined to a few military bases between Misrata and the Tunisian border. It is extremely rare to encounter Turkish military personnel outside of these bases.

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Dr Wolfram Lacher is a Project Director of Megatrends Afrika and a Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Division at SWP.

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Frederic Wehrey

The Jabal Akhdar

With its thickly forested slopes and bucolic meadows, the aptly named Jabal Akhdar seem a world away from Fezzan. Rising 800 meters above sea level (about 2,600 feet) and stretching350 kilometers (about 215 miles) from Benghazi in the south to Derna in the north, the mountains are Libya’s wettest region and home to its densest concentration of trees and its most arable land. It is also rich in biodiversity: though it constitutes just 1 percent of Libya’s surface area, Jabal Akhdar accounts for anywhere from 50 to 75 percent of its plant species, leading one climate activist from the area to dub the mountains and their forests “the lung of Libya.”

Though its populace lacks significant communal divides, the mountains have been the site of political instability and grievances against the government, especially given eastern Libya’s perception of relative decline after Qaddafi’s 1969 coup toppled the eastern-based Senussi dynasty. During the 1990s, these grievances informed a fierce Islamist insurgency against the regime that used the fortress-like gorges and caves of the Jabal Akhdar as a haven. Since the fall of Qaddafi, successive rounds of violence in eastern Libya, particularly during the 2014–2018 war that wracked Benghazi and Derna, only worsened the region’s environmental deterioration and vulnerability to climate change.

Today, the region is firmly under the control of Haftar and his Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF), who are nominally part of the GNU in Tripoli but who in practice govern eastern Libya as a separate administrative territory. Although Tripoli and the east have working-level coordination and collaboration on some issues, such as meteorological data collection and the exchange of research on seed varieties, steps toward more national-level climate cooperation invariably fall victim to the same elite rivalries and factionalism that plague other aspects of Libya’s governance.  Simultaneously, Haftar’s kleptocratic rule is exacting a severe toll on environmental protection in the Jabal region.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the activities of the LAAF Military Investment Authority. This organization is a profit-making enterprise for the Haftar family and has been involved in predatory illicit enterprises such as fuel smuggling and scrap metal harvesting. Reportedly, some of the illegally acquired scrap metal (which often is sold abroad) comes from equipment and components of the MMR.

The inhabitants of the Jabal Akhdar acutely feel the nexus of governance, climate change, and environmental devastation. As elsewhere, farmers in the area suffered from problems like electrical outages, supply chain disruptions (particularly seeds), rising costs of drilling for groundwater, and soil erosion caused by overgrazing and poor land management. All of these issues have been compounded by climate-induced temperature spikes and declining rainfall.

Furthermore, the region’s beekeepers—a niche but important industry, especially in the east, where honey is particularly prized for delicacies and traditional remedies—have seen their honey output decline drastically as climate change has pushed temperatures to ranges that are inhospitable for bees.

But the most catastrophic environmental affliction in the mountains is the rampant loss of tree and vegetation cover. Between 2005 and 2019, the Jabal Akhdar lost over 14,000 hectares of forest, with the rate of deforestation accelerating after 2011 as insecurity and lawlessness encouraged people to sell wood for charcoal and to embark on unchecked construction.

Government efforts to crack down on such illegal practices have been uneven, with better-armed militias and criminal groups sometimes responding to enforcement efforts with heavy gunfire. Conflicts in the east and elsewhere have also exacerbated deforestation as urban areas have expanded and new settlements have emerged to accommodate displaced persons.

Regardless of reason, the effects of deforestation have been uniformly harmful for citizens’ livelihoods, health, and properties. Deprived of tree cover, the average mean temperature in the area has risen, which in turn has made outbreaks of wildfires more likely. Already, soaring heat waves have sparked outbreaks of such destructive blazes, like the ones in 2013 and 2021 that swept through forests near Shahat and Al-Bayda, respectively. The absence of tree cover has also contributed to soil erosion and decreased agricultural outputs, while also increasing the prevalence of dust storms originating from the region.

More broadly, the human-caused transformation of the region’s natural environment, along with widespread corruption and decaying infrastructure, has worsened the damage from climate-induced floods like those that hit the eastern city of Al-Bayda in late 2020, displacing thousands. Most tragically, the city of Derna at the foothills of the Jabal Akhdar suffered a catastrophic loss of life—an estimated at 11,200 people—after two aging dams collapsed during Storm Daniel in early September 2023.

The same storm also displaced more than 40,000 people from Derna and other locales. The impact of Storm Daniel underscores how the malignant effects of politics and militia rule magnify climate shocks in Libya: in the case of Derna, Haftar’s military regime had long targeted and isolated the town because it had a history of opposition to his authority. This animosity contributed to the municipality’s unpreparedness and to the storm’s staggering death toll. 

The aftermath of the Derna tragedy has made it clear that local actors need to have both the capacity and the freedom to tackle climate adaptation and environmental stewardship. Municipalities in and around the Jabal Akhdar, as elsewhere, have taken some commendable steps on these fronts, with campaigns on water rationalization, well-digging, recycling drives, electricity conservation, and other actions toward sustainability.

On the crucial problem of deforestation, local civil society, journalists, and bloggers have been especially active. Reforestation initiatives in particular have proven enormously popular, with groups like the Libyan Wildlife Trust and the Boy Scouts planting millions of seedlings and sponsoring awareness campaigns in schools. Yet according to several observers, these efforts, while laudable, are not enough: Libyan civil society has not yet been able to realize its full potential as a bridge between the public and private sectors and as a voice for vulnerable communities.

 The activists themselves admit that their efforts cannot keep pace with environmental devastation, and they point to the need for a better-equipped and more robust response from official law enforcement entities. Moreover, in the east in particular, activists face restrictions from the area’s security forces. Though these forces do not directly target environmental and climate groups as long as their activities do not cross certain political red lines (like corruption or the role of the Haftar family), their presence still has a chilling effect.

 “Young people are willing, but they are afraid,” noted one official from the region. “There is no state support.” In a September 2023 interview, a member of a volunteer climate action group in eastern Libya gave an example of such interference, stating that their organization’s efforts to import weather monitoring equipment—to compensate for what this person believed was the inadequacy of the official meteorological service—were blocked by Haftar’s government because of supposed security concerns.

Relatedly, policing bodies in both the east and the west often have a distinctly ideological bent deriving from the Salafi current of Islam, evident in arrests that are not rooted in codified law but rather are against transgressions deemed to be un-Islamic. These arrests have included crackdowns on environmental activism like an “Earth Hour” event in Benghazi in 2017 and, more recently, in the arrests of animal rights defenders in the same city. In such an environment, it is not surprising that many climate activists operate from abroad or solely in the virtual space, while others confine their engagement to politically “safe” activities.

Separately, Haftar’s governing apparatus could try to coopt climate action as a form of legitimation, or greenwashing—especially as the issue attracts great funding and support from outside donors. Arab autocrats elsewhere have pursued similar tactics by focusing mostly on technical solutions, renewable energy plans, and ambitious net-zero pledges while sidelining the society-focused governance reforms and grassroots partnerships that effective climate adaptation requires. The urgency of such local-focused reforms is nowhere as apparent as in Libya’s vulnerable peripheral regions.

Conclusion: Building Grassroots Climate Resilience in Vulnerable Regions

The sheer scale of Libya’s climate fragility demands a radical departure from the status quo. In many respects, climate change accelerates and amplifies preexisting deficiencies in governance and inequalities that predate the chaos of the 2011 uprising and its aftermath. It also introduces new shocks, like heat waves, fires, and extended droughts. These impacts are worsening the health and livelihood of already at-risk populations—those in the agricultural sector, for instance—while creating new stresses on comparatively better-off citizens.

Endemic insecurity and successive rounds of national-level internal conflict starting in 2014 have understandably impeded concerted climate and environmental action by governments and citizens alike. “It’s hard to garner public support for trees when people’s lives are in danger,” admitted an environmental activist in 2013. But the peace that has emerged since a United Nations–brokered ceasefire in 2020 is one in which armed groups dominate the political and economic life of the country as dynasties of venal elites in both east and west carve up the spoils while stifling free expression and civil society. Such circumstances are hardly cause for optimism on climate adaptation.

At the most basic level, that adaptation should prioritize solving Libya’s water crisis by extending the GMMR to communities in need, halting the decay of its infrastructure, and rationalizing the use of the water it delivers. Among consumers, this rationalization can be accomplished principally through tariffs. Farmers can support the process through more efficient practices like the introduction of new seed varieties, a shift toward less water-intensive crops, and more sustainable techniques like hydroponic farming. In tandem, Libya should explore alternate sources of freshwater, like desalinization.

Today, most of Libya’s sixty desalination facilities are not operational, and the industry itself faces a lack of support owing to these maintenance issues and perception of its prohibitive cost. Yet with the rapid depletion of the country’s aquifers, that perception needs to change. Various innovative domestic proposals have been advanced for making desalinization in Libya more economically feasible; one proposal advanced by a Tuareg activist and former official would use dune-generated heat in Fezzan to power coastal desalinization plants.  Underpinning all these potential options is the pressing need for a national water strategy and an integrated water policy that will rationalize and safeguard its distribution across the sprawling country.

That need, in turn, speaks to another urgent imperative for Libya’s climate adaptation: vision and will at the top. As noted, the challenge of fiscal and political decentralization in Libya is deeply entrenched. On climate change, municipalities are hindered by legal and funding restrictions, such as the lack of legislative empowerment to tackle climate adaptation and the need to seek preapproval for revenue expenditure instead of having climate change measures built into their budgets.

Beyond this consideration, municipalities need greater authority and leeway and fewer bureaucratic obstacles to expeditiously access foreign funding, equipment, and expertise, such as the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Taqarib project and the European Union’s Tamsall effort. For their part, both the Libyan government and foreign donors should work to coordinate and “bundle” municipal-level projects, more efficiently identify best practices, more easily access outside funding, and scale-up successes.

Beyond town-level empowerment, interlocutors across all three regions surveyed in this article spoke about the need for greater space, protections, and support for civil society actors working on environmental protection and climate adaptation. Many acknowledged that, despite the groundswell of enthusiasm, such activism is still in its infancy. They suggested the need for greater education and acculturation of Libya’s youth on climate change, starting in schools.

These efforts are encouragingly underway by UNICEF in eastern Libya, but they need more buy-in from Libya’s authorities. More pressingly, though, Libyan authorities in the west and the east need to grant greater freedoms for independent civil society groups to operate freely and with foreign support, ending the restrictive laws that prevent them from doing so.

Relatedly, the dominance of Libya’s predatory armed groups over nearly every aspect of its political and economic life needs to transition to a law-based, accountable security sector—a Herculean problem that will not be solved anytime soon. Still, the urgency of tackling Libya’s climate adaptation and environmental devastation adds one more compelling reason for doing so.

In all three of the regions surveyed, interlocutors were unanimous in pointing to the militias as the primary culprits for the weakening of climate resilience, through predation on the environment and, indirectly, through the perpetuation of violent conflict and the resulting population displacements, disruptions to services, and damage to infrastructure and the economy.

Lastly, while the Jabal Nafusa, Fezzan, and the Jabal Akhdar share certain commonalities in their climate vulnerabilities, they are also distinctive subregions with their own communal and ethnolinguistic identities, histories, economic resources, and other factors that militate against the one-size-fits all approach encouraged by foreign states and organizations.

Addressing climate fragility in each of these areas therefore necessitates a multifaceted approach that recognizes and harnesses these local specificities, integrating on-the-ground knowledge, community-driven initiatives, and partnerships with civil society organizations. Ultimately, though, these bottom-up actions need to be accompanied by top-level will and resolve by Libyan elites, who must set aside self-aggrandizement and the pursuit of spoils to address the looming climate crisis.

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Frederic Wehrey is a senior fellow in the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where his research focuses on governance, conflict, and security in Libya, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf.

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Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

Rise: Social embeddedness and social acceptance

Such tactical choices become more understandable through their social context – that is, when considering what was socially acceptable or facilitated by social ties. Before militant Islamists became attractive allies with the escalation of conflicts in 2014, they were able to develop in an environment in which they and their perspectives enjoyed widespread social recognition. This was partly due to the prevailing moral codes under Gaddafi, but above all to the role of Islamists in the 2011 revolution.

It is true that Gaddafi had persecuted and demonised Islamist opponents; at times his regime had arrested young men simply for attending early morning prayers. At the same time, however, Gaddafi had enforced a strict moral code – in the words of a then young Islamist who had spent several years in the notorious Abu Salim prison: “Libya was a conservative, isolated society.

Gaddafi had banned alcohol, prostitution and nightclubs. During Ramadan, everyone fasted. Being religious was entirely normal, and many people who were later labelled as Islamists were simply devout.”

With certain limits, the regime even tolerated a jihadist underground culture in the 2000s. At least for a while, the secret services covertly encouraged the recruitment of young men to fight in Iraq and did not prevent the families of fighters from publicly celebrating them as martyrs when they received news of their deaths.

In cities such as Darna, Ajdabiya and Sabratha, networks developed that deeply embedded jihadist ideas in parts of local society. For young men with this social background, jihadism was simply an aspect of piety.

During the 2011 revolution, Islamists actively participated in the struggle, and thereby emerged as prominent leaders. In this way, they accumulated considerable “revolutionary social capital”, which increased their social standing all the more dramatically since they had been in exile, in prison or under surveillance only a short time before.

Hardly any of them formed purely Islamist – let alone jihadist – units. Instead, just like others, they mobilised under the banner of the revolution. The revolutionary armed groups were mostly centred on individual cities. Fighters primarily joined groups with whom they had family, friend or neighbourly ties.

The fact that there were more Islamists in some groups – such as those from Darna – than in others was mainly due to local subcultures. But even in these groups, die-hard jihadists fought side by side with young men who were simply committed to the revolution.

Deep bonds often developed between Islamist and non-Islamist commanders from different groups during the joint struggle, and these bonds lasted for years. Of course, there was also mistrust – especially between figures who had not fought closely together and only encountered each other when the first rivalries emerged after the fall of the regime.

Three aspects were decisive for the ascent of militant Islamist movements after 2011. Firstly, the revolution gave rise to many charismatic leaders of armed groups who used an Islamic idiom. It was often difficult to determine which of them were Islamists, jihadists or simply devout – the boundaries were blurred.

Secondly, in the years after 2011, politicians and commanders who were part of the militant Islamist spectrum were able to build on the solidarity of those with whom they had fought during the revolution.

At least in the initial phase, they enjoyed high social standing, which showed in the election results in 2012 and subsequently dwindled as conflict and insecurity spread. Thirdly, groups led by figures who ranged from pious to jihadist after the fall of Gaddafi often included both Islamists and non-Islamists.

Most, though not all, of the leaders of the Abu Salim Brigade in Darna were jihadists, but among their fighters were “many ordinary young people from Darna who smoked and put gel in their hair”.

The founders of the Rafallah Sahati Brigade in Benghazi “espoused Islamist ideas. Most of us were former prisoners. But many of our members were Shabab who smoked, took drugs and listened to music. We were open to everyone.

It was similar with other groups, such as the 17 February Brigade or the Martyrs of Zintan Brigade.” Leading figures in Zawiya and Sabratha such as Mohamed al-Kilani, Omar al-Mukhtar and Shaaban Hadiya were widely perceived as Islamists – but in fact “Hadiya was a charismatic legal scholar who had been a unifying figure in 2011, not an extremist”.

Kilani and Mukhtar were “not members of any ideological organisations. Omar al-Mukhtar had been Abu Salim in prison, but he was simply deeply religious. And many fighters were not – they smoked and so on.” The leaders of the Faruq Brigade in Zawiya, who were later vilified as terrorists by political opponents, were religious – “but among the members there were more people who drank alcohol than strict believers”.

These aspects explain why many revolutionaries did not see those militant Islamists with whom they had personal connections as a threat. And for the same reasons, Islamist ideology was not so alien to many of them.

For young men in the Abu Salim brigade from Darna, for example, chants (nasha’id) from the al-Qaeda movement were commonplace. The same applied to the black flag with the Islamic Shahada, which was used by IS and al-Qaeda groups, among others. In Benghazi, “we had to explain to the Shabab how this was perceived internationally”.

Looking back, an Islamist revolutionary from the city said: “I can understand why many people liked the black flag. But it didn’t make a good impression, it looked like IS.”

Militant Islamist groups in Libya were able to operate openly in society.

This background also helps to contextualise why jihadists were able to continue operating openly in society when they separated themselves from the revolutionaries and formed their own groups – in other words, why they emerged as a social movement and were not forced underground as isolated cells.

In Benghazi, many initially regarded Ansar al-Sharia as a group of devout young men interested in the common good.100 As recently as 2013, a member of the local council was of the opinion that “all they want is Sharia law” – and after all, the fundamental role of Sharia enjoyed support across political divides in the first few years post 2011.

Even when the leaders of Ansar al-Sharia openly rejected the state and democratic processes, their former brothers-in-arms advocated resolving such differences of opinion through dialogue.

Last but not least, this explains the permeability between revolutionaries and jihadists and the fact that social ties facilitated alliances between them. It was all the easier for members of the Rafallah Sahati Brigade to join Ansar al-Sharia because they were reuniting with their former comrades-in-arms.

IS also initially appeared in the guise of fighters with whom the revolutionaries previously had personal relationships – such as a person who was sent to Benghazi by IS in Iraq in 2013 to demand that three revolutionary commanders submit to the organisation, albeit in vain.

In Sabratha, a leading revolutionary acted as an intermediary with IS when negotiating the release of hostages, using relationships dating back to the joint fight in 2011: “Abdallah Haftar [the local IS leader] had been with us in the mountains in 2011. He was a brave fighter – a simple person, not ideological, interested in money. He also fought in our ranks in 2014.

Social ties and embeddedness in local society therefore played an important role in the spread of militant Islamists in former revolutionary strongholds such as Benghazi and Darna.

The later IS capital of Sirte, on the other hand, was anything but a revolutionary stronghold; there, another logic applied. Ansar al-Sharia and later IS established themselves in the city as small, isolated minorities that benefited from the absence of a military counterweight. Sirte had experienced the revolution as a defeat, the revolutionaries did not have a broad social base there, and the city’s elite was in prison, in exile or dead.

Among the founders of Ansar al-Sharia in Sirte were members of the Faruq Brigade from Misrata – a revolutionary group that included both Islamists and nonIslamists in its ranks. The Faruq Brigade split in two when part of it settled in Sirte and merged into Ansar al-Sharia.

This split involved the Sirte group’s geographical and social distancing from its former brothers-in-arms, even if relations between some members of both groups continued. Ansar al-Sharia in turn later formed the nucleus of IS in the city. Therefore, the rise of IS in Sirte differs from the pattern in other Libyan cities with regards to the social embeddedness of its jihadists.

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Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Luis Aleman, Bryan Dawson and Nii Simmonds

Standing at a crucial crossroads, Libya is a nation brimming with promise yet besieged by peril. Recent strides by the “6+6 Committee” in establishing election laws have sparked hope in a country long plagued by turmoil.

This development, a product of concerted effort following a decade of instability and foreign intervention failures, signals a potential shift towards a representative democracy. However, despite these advances, Libya’s journey toward stable governance remains overshadowed by significant political and technical challenges.

The updated draft election laws signify important progress; yet, they fall short of incorporating vital elements required for conducting successful elections, notably adequate security protocols and a comprehensive regulatory structure. This gap is accentuated by adjustments in UN policies.

The enduring conflict has embedded a profound mistrust among Libya’s diverse factions and regions, making the prospect of fair elections seem remote without additional efforts towards reconciliation. Furthermore, the international community’s urgency for quick elections risks overshadowing the need for unity, bypassing these indispensable issues.

This context is clarified by specific critiques from the UN regarding the preparedness of the election laws, drafted by the 6+6 committee, to effectively support the electoral process in Libya, highlighting concerns over their current state and implications for future elections.

A major impediment to progress is the leadership crisis. The interim Government of National Unity (GNU), initially set up to transition the nation to democratic elections, has overstayed its mandate, exacerbating governance polarization. The eastern-based Libyan parliament’s declaration of the GNU’s illegitimacy further complicates the situation, raising the question of whether another transitional body is necessary to supervise the electoral process.

After more than a decade of chaos, Libya finds itself deeply divided, lacking robust national institutions and democratic experience, and skeptical about fair representation. While previous transitional plans, premised on swift elections, have failed, the 6+6 Committee’s work offers hope. The international community’s role should pivot from imposing solutions to supporting Libyan-led initiatives with aid and security support, particularly for displaced persons and migrants often sidelined in political discussions.

Libya’s future hinges on rising as a sovereign nation with institutions that represent all its citizens. The path ahead, though arduous, calls for patient, Libyan-directed progress and international support that emphasizes assistance over imposition.

The nexus of oil wealth and future challenges

Libya’s economic narrative is a complex interplay of immense potential and daunting challenges. Home to Africa’s largest oil reserves, Libya’s economy is heavily reliant on hydrocarbons, which account for 95 percent of its revenue. This dependence places the nation at a critical juncture as it grapples with political instability and the urgent need for economic diversification, especially in the face of the global green transition.

The country’s hydrocarbon wealth, while a significant asset, also narrates a tale of untapped potential amidst a shifting global energy landscape. Billions in frozen assets, mired in international disputes, further symbolize the tumultuous post-2011 revolution period. However, this scenario also presents an opportunity for Libya to redefine its economic trajectory by investing in diversification and stabilizing its political landscape. Importantly, Libya’s oil reserves hold significant strategic value for European energy security, offering a potential stabilizing force in the region’s energy supply.

China’s economic and geopolitical interests in Libya

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), sometimes referred to as “the New Silk Road,” was launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013. BRI is a massive global overland and sea infrastructure development strategy that seeks to expand China’s economic and political influence.

Originally intended to create infrastructure linking East Asia and Europe, BRI has expanded to include Latin America, Oceania, and Africa. The scale of China’s ambitions is unprecedented, but so is global receptiveness. According to the Council on Foreign Relations, “147 countries—accounting for two-thirds of the world’s population and 40 percent of global GDP—have signed on to projects or indicated an interest in doing so.”

The Government of National Accord (GNA), under the leadership of Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, was established on December 17, 2015, as a provisional authority aimed at unifying Libya’s divided political factions. This effort was part of the Libyan Political Agreement (LPA), endorsed by the United Nations, positioning the GNA as the legitimate interim government with its headquarters in Tripoli.

Despite gaining international recognition, the GNA struggled with consolidating control over Libya, contending with opposition from various militias and the rival Libyan House of Representatives (HoR) based in the east, alongside the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by Khalifa Haftar, during a period marked by the Second Libyan Civil War. In a significant move towards international cooperation, Fayez al-Sarraj, representing Libya’s GNA, embraced the Belt and Road Initiative in July 2018, advocating for a broader Chinese investment in the country.

China, as the world’s second-largest oil consumer, eagerly accepted this overture. Chinese enterprises have played a substantial role in the development of Libya’s oil infrastructure, including the construction of pipelines and refineries. Before the outbreak of the Libyan Civil War, Libya was a source of roughly 3 percent of China’s crude oil imports.

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The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

After the fall of Gaddafi, Islamist revolutionary leaders in Benghazi and Darna had campaigned among their followers to join state institutions and support political processes such as the 2012 elections.

Groups such as Ansar al-Sharia split from the revolutionaries precisely because they rejected that state. With his attack on the revolutionaries, Haftar seemed to vindicate Ansar al-Sharia’s uncompromising position: “Ansar told the Shabab [young men, fighters]: ‘You see? We told you that we have to fight against the state, that we have to conquer it! Now the state is waging war against you!’”

Later, after Haftar’s allies attacked the revolutionaries’ homes, IS tried to attract followers by emphasising that it rejected any compromise with the enemy.Wolfram Lacher

At times, this uncompromising attitude seemed to increase IS’s chances of success.

In January 2015, for example, a member of the Shura Council expected IS to win the battle for Benghazi, “because they are brutal fighters who will kill anyone who gets in their way. The tribes will submit to them to save the lives of their sons.”

A politician whose three sons were killed in the fight against Haftar said at the time that many who were now fighting for IS were not Islamists, but had joined it because of the other side’s violence.

Another person close to the leadership of the Shura Council said at the same time: “If we need IS to defeat Haftar, then let IS come. My family has lost everything, our house was burnt down, thousands of families have fled Benghazi. I have nothing left to lose.”

According to a former leading member of the Rafallah Sahati Brigade, such radicalisation processes explain why many members of the group first turned to Ansar al-Sharia and later to IS.

Last but not least, there were people whose support or mobilisation for militant Islamists came from opportunism, such as the tendency to join a force that seemed to be on the way to military victory: “When IS suddenly took over almost the entire province of al-Anbar [in Iraq] in 2014, many in Benghazi were impressed.”

Similarly, in Sirte, the triumph of IS in Iraq was a strong argument for members of Ansar al-Sharia to submit to the caliphate. A resident of Darna told of a pharmacist who had sought a licence from IS for his business on his own initiative: “I was surprised and asked him why. He replied: ‘Libya always wanted to be a powerful Arab state.

And now look at IS, its territory is bigger than that of Great Britain!’ In Darna, there were fighters who “joined every new wave – first IS, later Haftar”.

In Benghazi, IS fighters included “people who drank alcohol, consumed drugs or robbed banks and used IS as a cover for their self-enrichment”. In Sirte, where supporters of the Gaddafi regime had been militarily defeated and subjected to persecution by revolutionaries from Misrata, IS offered them an opportunity to obtain weapons, find protection and perhaps even take revenge on Misrata.

Decline: Tactical logics of action

Similar tactical considerations can be seen in the decline of militant Islamist groups. And here too, such objectives are located on a spectrum that ranges from reactions to an immediate threat to sober costbenefit calculations.

The fact that former revolutionaries in Sabratha, Darna and Misrata went from initial tolerance towards IS to a costly confrontation with the organisation was directly linked to the threat posed by IS.

In Sabratha, the armed groups tolerated IS supporters “until they started kidnapping and killing people”. Confrontation only occurred when the IS offshoot suddenly tried to gain control of the city after a devastating American airstrike in February 2016 – and was subsequently driven out.

In Darna, IS repeatedly clashed with the Abu Salim Brigade as of mid-2014. Together with other organisations, the latter formed the Mujahidin Shura Council of Darna (Majlis Shura Mujhahidi Darna), which was briefly joined by part of the local Ansar al-Sharia group before it broke away from the alliance. But open warfare between IS and its opponents only erupted when IS assassinated a prominent Shura Council commander – former LIFG member Nasr al-Okr – and when the Shura Council leader, Salim Derbi, was killed in the ensuing clashes.

Fighting in Darna continued for eight months. External observers usually described this confrontation as an internal conflict between jihadists, namely between IS and groups ideologically affiliated with al-Qaeda. In reality, however, the latter description only applied to part of the hard core of the Abu Salim Brigade.

And as for the fight against IS, the Shura Council not only succeeded in mobilising broad support in Darna; it also increasingly tried to shed its jihadist image in public statements.

. It is difficult to judge whether this also involved genuine ideological change among at least some of the leaders of the Shura Council, as well-informed observers insist. Nevertheless, the fight against IS in Darna must be seen as the beginning of a process whereby the local revolutionaries distanced themselves from jihadism – even if not all of them did so.

The later renaming of the Shura Council as the “Darna Protection Force” (Quwat Himayat Darna) followed the same logic. The Protection Force avoided any jihadist references and presented its resistance against Haftar as the city’s collective struggle against dictatorship and support for a “civilian state”.

A commander of the Protection Force, who escaped to western Libya after the group’s defeat, emphasised that the group no longer had any links to jihadists.73 Even more drastic and consequential was the change that occurred in Misrata when IS threatened to expand from Sirte towards Misrata.

From early 2015 onwards, IS brought Sirte under its control and repeatedly attacked an armed group from Misrata that maintained a presence on Sirte’s outskirts. Although this raised awareness of the threat in Misrata, it did not yet trigger mobilisation.

Leading players in Misrata also continued to allow their city to be used as a logistical hub by Haftar’s opponents in Benghazi – from which IS elements in Benghazi also benefited.

This only changed when IS attacked checkpoints between Sirte and Misrata in May 2016, threatening the city itself The spontaneous mobilisation of Misratan armed groups prompted a large-scale offensive that would last for months.

Hundreds of fighters in the city were killed before IS was defeated in December 2016. As one fighter said at the time: “The day after the attack on the checkpoint in al-Sdada, I joined the offensive.

Because IS was closing in, it even appeared in Misrata itself.” This was accompanied by a profound shift in attitudes towards militant Islamists in general. Interrogations and documents found in Sirte revealed that IS in Sirte and Benghazi had been able to benefit from the support for Haftar’s opponents in Benghazi, which was channelled through Misrata. Social pressure in Misrata then put an end to this support.

Political calculations are also likely to have played a role in this development. Misratan politicians had been trying to find new allies in eastern Libya since the formation of a unity government in early 2016.

This required them to end their support for the groups in Benghazi. The shift in Misrata was an important reason why opponents of Haftar who had been driven out of Benghazi increasingly tried to distance themselves from the jihadists. One example of this was the founding of the Benghazi Defence Companies.

The leaders read out the founding declaration in June 2016 in front of the Libyan flag, with an army officer in their midst, and announced that they were following the rulings of the Dar al-Ifta’, i.e. the mufti in Tripoli.

By doing so, they sought to differentiate themselves from the Shura Council, which Ansar al-Sharia had prevented from using the national flag, as well as from all groups that referred to jihadist legal scholars.

They also tried to screen out fighters with links to extremists during the recruitment process – with mixed success, as described above. After they were accused of such links, they cut ties with dubious figures, which they never tired of emphasising when meeting with the military chain of command in Tripoli and Misrata, with British and American representatives – and with the author.

Individual fighters also sought protection by distancing themselves from militant Islamists. A young man from a western Libyan city who had fought against Haftar in Benghazi told the author: “One of my brothers had joined IS in Syria and was killed there.

When I came back from Benghazi, people started asking questions about my ideological tendencies. Later, some distant relatives of mine fought in the ranks of IS in Sabratha. For all these reasons, I sought protection at home and found it in the [anonymised] brigade.

When Haftar attacked Tripoli in 2019, his opponents had learned from this experience. They were now acutely aware of the toxic nature of links with extremists – which the Haftar camp and its foreign allies sought to fabricate from the first day of the war.

Prominent commanders from Benghazi, accused of such links rightly or wrongly, wanted to join the fight against Haftar in Tripoli. However, both figures from their own circles and western Libyan leaders advised them to stay away so as not to harm the cause.

Former foot soldiers of the Shura Council were able to join the forces fighting Haftar, provided they had never been members of Ansar al-Sharia or IS. In addition, many other young men who had been forcibly displaced from the east of the country by Haftar’s forces took up arms. But instead of forming their own unit, which would have attracted negative media attention, they joined various western Libyan groups.

Previously, they had found themselves in a precarious situation in western Libya, as displaced young men from the east faced generalised suspicion of being terrorists. They were often held without reason and without trial in the notorious prison of the “Deterrence Apparatus,” one of the most powerful militias in Tripoli.

By joining western Libyan groups as individual fighters, including the Deterrence Apparatus, they countered such suspicions and found protection.

***

Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Frederic Wehrey

The Jabal Nafusa

Rising to 900 meters above sea level (nearly 3,000 feet), the Jabal Nafusa are a rugged mountainous plateau that arcs around the Jafara plain west of Tripoli and stretches over 400 kilometers (about 250 miles) to the Tunisian border. Historically, the region has been of marginal political and strategic significance, though this changed with the 2011 revolution, given the range’s role as a base for anti-Qaddafi rebels and its location alongside routes into the capital.

The divisions within the Nafusa region that emerged during that period—as some towns supported the uprising and others opposed it—reflected in many instances the Qaddafi regime’s exploitation of intercommunal tensions by granting favored communities grazing land, employment in the security services, and even access to water.

Roughly speaking, the most prominent division today in the region is an ethnolinguistic one between Arab communities, who historically were pastoralists, and the Amazigh people, who were predominately settled farmers (hadhar).

That said, neither the Amazigh nor the Arab communities in the Nafusa region behave today as a monolithic bloc: allegiances and alliances among their respective towns often straddle the ethnolinguistic line and are constantly shifting.

Against this backdrop of fragmentation, climate change and its attendant worsening of water shortages has sharpened intercommunal tensions in the Nafusa region and tensions between Nafusa communities and the Tripoli government.

Historically farmed since antiquity, the eastern portions of the Nafusa range are the most fertile and productive, particularly for the cultivation of olive, fig, and almond trees. And even though the region has always grappled with droughts, sandstorms, and erratic rainfall, anthropogenic climate change and global warming are causing a different sort of threat.

Local farmers have noticed that winters are getting warmer while summers have become drier and hotter, without the usual cooling-off in the evening, leading to outbreaks of wildfires that required the dispatch of firefighting equipment from outside the country.

Rainfall appears less frequently, and sandstorms are changing in seasonality and increasing in intensity, the result of both global warming and local factors such as declining plant cover and soil erosion. Desertification—a direct result of climate change—is increasing as well, with expanding sand reducing the area of cultivable land.

The impact of these stressors has been magnified by the aforementioned inefficiencies in water supply and political marginalization. Qaddafi’s historical mistrust and suppression of the Amazigh people led him to deny predominantly Amazigh towns in the Nafusa region access to the MMR network, forcing a reliance on wells and water tanks that continues to this day.

The MMR’s discontinuity continues to plague the predominately Amazigh towns of Yifren, Nalut, Jadu, and Qala’a, as well as some Arab towns like Zintan, which was scheduled to be connected to the pipeline system before the 2011 revolution interrupted that work. Consequently, a significant number of Nafusa communities have been forced to rely on water shipments delivered by tanker trucks.

But these trucks, which haul water up steep mountain roads from a reservoir at the base of the Jabal Nafusa, are too few in number to service the entire region and often are prohibitively expensive for many families. Accessing deep groundwater aquifers through excavation and well-digging is another option, but this too is a costly and often unsuccessful endeavor.

Moreover, wells in some locales often are too few to cover the population’s needs or have fallen into disrepair. Even in communities that the MMR reaches, the water supply is often limited and inconsistent.

In the face of such infrastructural and climate challenges, some Amazigh communities in Nafusa have taken to reviving ancestral adaptation and stewardship mechanisms including agroforestry, terracing techniques, and water management practices.

One such method, agdal, is a communal approach to land utilization characterized by the cyclic utilization of grazing areas, a mindful approach to water consumption that prioritizes sustainable sustenance, and, most importantly, a profound set of social and ethical principles centered around the responsible management of fertile and water-abundant lands.

Traditional customs like agdal enable Amazigh communities to gather and preserve water during the rainy seasons and thrive amid challenging environmental circumstances.

Elsewhere, municipal leaders in Nafusa are leading grassroots efforts on climate adaptation, focusing on rationalizing water and electricity consumption and combating desertification.

They are pushing for greater local empowerment while soliciting services from the GNU in Tripoli and support from foreign states and donors. But such efforts remain hampered by meager budgets from authorities in the capital.

In one notable case, the mayors of three Nafusa towns—Jadu, Yifren, and Kabaw—reportedly diverted the 150,000 dinar allotment from the Tripoli government for the purchase of an official car to fund environmental services and to address their towns’ water scarcity problems.

More broadly, though, municipalities suffer from Libya’s aforementioned lack of political and fiscal decentralization, a shortcoming acutely felt by people in other parts of the country grappling with climate change, especially those in Libya’s underdeveloped desert south.

Fezzan

The southwest region of Fezzan, stretching over 200,000 square kilometers (nearly 125,000 square miles), is Libya’s driest, hottest, and most inhospitable area, marked by a Saharan topography of sand dune seas, gravel-strewn plateaus, volcanic mountains, dry riverbeds, and oasis depressions.

Climate change is thus a particular concern for its inhabitants. As it has been for millennia, water continues to be a prized and contested commodity in this region, evident in Fezzan’s role in supplying the aquifer-fed water to the MMR pipeline, a quality that has only grown in importance as Libya’s northern groundwater supplies are depleted by salinization.

Water has also aggravated a deepening sense of socioeconomic exclusion by Fezzan’s inhabitants, who comprise 10 percent of Libya’s population.

Today, Fezzan is Libya’s poorest region, even though it is home to important oil fields that produce one-quarter of the country’s total crude output. Though Qaddafi set up thousands of hectares of state-owned farms in the south, the infrastructure has fallen into disrepair since the 2011 revolution.

Moreover, the Qaddafi regime rewarded favored Arab tribes with preferential access to the smuggling trade and other privileges and marginalized non-Arab ethnolinguistic minorities, such as the Tabu and the Tuareg. The Tuareg, however, were slightly better off because they had been included in the security services and had access to agricultural land.

Those disparities are felt today in outbreaks of violent conflict between and within these groups, often over access to increasingly important fixed economic streams derived from the cross-border smuggling of people and goods as well as access to the region’s oil fields.

Climate change, with its attendant effects of water scarcity, expanding desertification, and extended droughts, will further inflame these fissures and also amplify the grievances the people of Fezzan feel toward the north.

Already, Fezzan’s importance as a source of water has been leveraged as a means of conveying those grievances, with tribes and protesters dismantling or otherwise sabotaging pumps along the MMR network, at one point at a rate of four pumps per month.

In the vital Hassawna area of Fezzan, which supplies Libya with 60 percent of its water, vandalism of wells diminished water output by over 30 percent, causing shortages in the north.

Rapidly diminishing groundwater is yet another problem, especially in the Murzuq Basin, where a major aquifer provides water to towns and farms in the southwest portion of Fezzan not connected to the MMR. According to one projection, the aquifer may be depleted as soon as 2037, causing severe socioeconomic damage throughout the area.

In the Tuareg and Tabu communities of the south, the perception of municipal neglect is magnified by deeply entrenched feelings of ethnolinguistic discrimination by Arab elites in the north.

In the southwest municipality of Ubari, for example—home to substantial agricultural land and Libya’s largest oil field, and the site of fierce intercommunal and political conflict from 2014 to 2016—Tuareg residents have long complained about the diversion of water and petroleum wealth to the north. Some believe that this diversion, and the attendant exodus of youth from the region, will pose an existential crisis for their survival as a distinct minority.

“The Tuareg will disappear,” noted one Tuareg activist from the area, who served as a former deputy minister of water. He described a proposal by a young local Tuareg engineer to purify sewage water and use drip-irrigation to cultivate a tree line from Ubari to Sabha in order to counter desertification without endangering future water access.

“As long as there are people there is sewage, so it is sustainable,” he maintained. But the engineer’s plan remained unrealized, he stated, owing to a lack of support from Tripoli. 

The effects of water scarcity, compounded by climate change, will disproportionately affect Fezzan’s most vulnerable inhabitants.

Even with the deterioration of agriculture infrastructure through conflict, theft, and neglect since 2011, many still depend on farming for their livelihood. Displaced persons and migrants—whose numbers in Fezzan are likely to grow in the face of climate shocks and slow-onset climate pressures—are especially reliant on agricultural work, sometimes in forced labor conditions under armed groups and smugglers.

Though men provide the primary labor, women often assist in the rearing of livestock, and children under the age of sixteen provide farming labor, especially during school vacations.

Given its remoteness, the south also faces challenges of transporting crops to northern markets. Road networks are especially vulnerable to worsening sandstorms, which raise transportation costs.

Throughout Fezzan, there are often fruitful exchanges between private and public entities in towns and cities. One such meeting took place at a workshop on the challenges and prospects of sustainable development in southern Libya, convened in February 2023 between Tripoli University, Sebha University, Sahara and Sahel Observatory, and the Libyan Center for Studies & Researches for Environmental Science and Technology.

An agricultural research center in the northern coastal city of Misrata, as another example, is teaching farmers in the south to grow crops using less water and to use water with greater salinity, while also introducing newer, more durable seed varieties that are better adapted to the increasingly arid conditions.

Even with these indicators of progress, municipal officials in Fezzan have complained vociferously about the lack of appropriate central government legislation, authorization, and funding, which would empower them to act as agents for climate adaptation rather than simply as providers of services such as water and waste removal.

They also face outmoded laws that prohibit direct interaction with foreign companies and officials, which prevent them from obtaining outside expertise and equipment. Partly as a result, local-level efforts to harness the region’s great potential in solar and wind remain sporadic and unrealized.

These same concerns about sustainability in the face of government inertia are also present in Libya’s third climate-affected periphery, the mountains of the east, where historically abundant rainfall is rapidly diminishing.

***

Frederic Wehrey is a senior fellow in the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where his research focuses on governance, conflict, and security in Libya, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf.

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Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

Social Mechanisms in the Rise and Fall of Militant Islamists

Many of the patterns that are emphasised by prevailing approaches to jihadist mobilisation are also visible in the spread of militant Islamist groups in Libya. Young men joined these groups, and other militias made pacts with them to defend themselves against threats from third parties or because they assumed that militant Islamists had the best military prospects.

Such mechanisms are summarised below as tactical logics of action. Tactical considerations can also help to explain the decline of militant Islamists – namely when such groups no longer had any chance of prevailing militarily and could no longer offer protection, and having connections to them became a vulnerability.

However, such tactical logics of action do not explain why militant Islamists in Libya expanded rapidly in the period 2012–2014, although they were not yet operating in the context of an open conflict at that time.

They also do not provide a sufficient answer to the question of why militant Islamists did not benefit from the outbreak of the war over Tripoli in 2019, as they did in the second civil war in 2014– 2015.

Two other social mechanisms offer complementary explanations. Firstly, their social embeddedness made it easier for militant Islamists to gain social acceptance through mutual trust, loyalty and consensual ideological discourse.

The decline of militant Islamist movements therefore also manifested itself as increasing social isolation, as a distancing of their former allies and followers, along with a shift in societal discourse.

A final mechanism – the search for social recognition – helps to understand how dynamically and rapidly such processes of association and dissociation can take place. Of relevance here is the dialectical relationship between the quest for distinction and for conformity.

Rise: Tactical logics of action

Tactical considerations propelled both the rise of militant Islamists and their fall. These include a spectrum of logics of action ranging from pure opportunism to tactical radicalisation and emotionally charged acts of revenge. It is often difficult to judge whether actors operated out of sober calculation or emotional affect; in many cases, both may have played a role.

What these logics of action have in common is that they reflect reactions to the conflict or expectations about its future course. One example of how difficult it is to separate different motivations is the tolerance of many actors for militant Islamists in the period 2011–2014.

As shown below, this tolerance was partly rooted in social proximity and loyalties that go back to the 2011 war. However, the question of whether actors felt threatened by militant Islamists – or whether their violence was rather directed against their political opponents – played an equally important role.

In Benghazi, many leaders of revolutionary groups considered themselves Islamists and displayed a certain lenience towards the murders in the city – at least some of which were certainly attributable to militant Islamists.

A leading figure in the Rafallah Sahati Brigade told the author in November 2012 that former intelligence officers had only themselves to blame if they fell victim to murders, as their mere presence threatened social peace.

According to him, the extremists responsible for some of the murders could be appeased by excluding former regime officials from political life. In Darna, the leaders of the most powerful armed group, the Abu Salim Brigade, had a similar perspective on the killings in their city.

In April 2014, a leading figure in the Muslim Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party (JCP) admitted that jihadists were probably responsible for some of the murders in Benghazi, but at the same time played down the danger posed by Ansar al-Sharia.

This forbearing attitude also explains why extremists who later joined Ansar al-Sharia or IS were sometimes able to operate under the guise of state institutions, such as the Supreme Security Committee, in the first few years after 2011 and thus gained access to state resources – such as in Sirte. It is obvious that such access to resources had to be conducive to mobilisation, as emphasised by theories of social movements as well as analyses of Islamist groups in other contexts.

It is not always clear at what point it changed from being a question of tolerance to one of of alliances. However, the more the conflicts escalated, the more actors were willing to make pacts with militant Islamists.

For example, a revolutionary commander in Sabratha said in retrospect about the involvement of later IS members in the town’s armed groups: “We knew them, we tolerated them until they started kidnapping and killing people. Before that, we didn’t care about them, and we thought it was good that they were supporting the fight against Assad in Syria.

In the 2014 war, we were already aware of Abdallah Haftar’s [later head of IS in Sabratha] inclination towards IS, but he fought with us as an individual, he didn’t have his own group. However, we decided to only give him heat-seeking missiles one by one – because we knew we could soon be in conflict with him and his kind. We never considered IS as an ally – they were just individuals fighting with us.”

In Benghazi, it became particularly clear how conflict dynamics contributed to the formation of alliances with militant Islamists. The alliance formed between the main revolutionary armed groups and Ansar al-Sharia in the Benghazi Revolutionaries Shura Council in June 2014 was a direct reaction to the attacks they had been subjected to by Haftar’s alliance since May.

“This is a counter-revolution! Haftar has not only attacked Ansar al-Sharia, but also the revolutionaries. Of course we are now fighting together against Haftar,” one of the leaders of the alliance told the author at the time.

Voices that opposed this alliance – not least for tactical reasons – were in the minority. Prominent among them was Ziyad Balam, head of the Omar al-Mukhtar Brigade, who refused to join the Shura Council.

According to Balam, he warned the leader of the Shura Council, Wissam ben Hamid, against allying with Ansar al-Sharia: “I told Wissam: ‘Foreign governments regard Ansar al-Sharia as al-Qaeda, and here in Libya they are associated with the assassinations.

Foreign fighter jets will come and bomb you.’ But Wissam dismissed the warning – he thought he could quickly defeat Haftar, make peace with Haftar’s allies and then once again distance himself from Ansar al-Sharia.”

Such logic later repeated itself in a modified form, after Haftar’s opponents, having been driven out of Benghazi, realised how much the alliance with jihadists had harmed them. By forming the Benghazi Defence Companies, they actually sought to distance themselves from jihadists, as explained below. However, in order to reach Benghazi from central Libya, they collaborated with fighters from Ajdabiya who were accused of having links to jihadists.

At the time, the group’s leaders defended this approach: “It is true that Usama al-Jadhran used to be with Ansar al-Sharia and is now with us, but he is not really religious. We need him until Ajdabiya, then we can get rid of him.” But in retrospect, the group’s most important figure, Ismail Sallabi, admitted: “The problem lay in our alliance with Ajdabiya, with Jadhran’s people.

They had their own connections with extremists, and we had little influence over the composition of their group.” One of the most controversial issues is the relationship between Haftar’s opponents in Benghazi and the local branch of the Islamic State.

While the Haftar camp demonised all opponents as Dawaesh (IS members), his opponents often denied any alliance with IS. With the passage of time, a more nuanced picture has emerged. In the words of one member of the Shura Council: “When IS supporters appeared, many of our fighters said: ‘Let them fight, the defence of our city unites us.’ Others confronted Wissam [ben Hamid], asking how he could fight alongside IS. Wissam replied that he was not in a position to fight the group.”

Another member of the Shura Council confirmed this: “After Haftar’s militias attacked our homes in October 2014, we were forced to withdraw into the city to protect our families. These attacks drove fighters into the arms of IS.

I spoke to Wissam about this. He told me that he couldn’t open a second front against IS now and had to give them some ammunition, otherwise they would attack us. But he was trying to prevent IS from gaining strength by only giving them a few weapons. Later, when we learnt that IS was buying weapons and ammunition from Haftar’s people, we stopped altogether.”

During the civil war of 2014–15, groups such as Ansar al-Sharia and IS benefited from alliances with revolutionary groups.

However, groups such as Ansar al-Sharia and IS not only benefited from alliances with revolutionary groups, but also from the fact that some of the latter became radicalised through conflicts.

***

Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Frederic Wehrey

Libya’s climate-vulnerable regions of Jabal Nafusa, Fezzan, and Jabal Akhdar underscore the important role played by civil society and municipalities in protecting marginalized communities.

A vast, arid, oil-dependent country of nearly 7 million people, Libya is acutely exposed to the deleterious effects of climate change. These problems include soaring temperatures, declining rainfall, rising sea levels, extended droughts, and sand and dust storms of increasing frequency, duration, and intensity, to name a few. The Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative Country Index ranks Libya 126 of 182 states, just after Iraq, in the lower-middle tier denoting most vulnerable countries.

The diminishing availability of water is Libya’s most pressing climate-related risk. Eighty percent of the country’s potable water supply is drawn from nonreplenishable fossil aquifers through a network of pipes known as the Great Man-Made River (GMMR), which suffers from deteriorating infrastructure, evaporation in open reservoirs, unsustainable extraction rates, and uneven service to Libya’s far-flung towns.

The lack of a national water strategy or integrated water policy, along with heavily subsidized water tariffs, has further exacerbated the effects of this scarcity. The provision of clean water increasingly has become a source of regional, communal, and political competition. Electricity is similarly threatened by climate disruptions, particularly temperature spikes, due in no small part again to eroding infrastructure and heavy subsidization, which contributes to exorbitant consumption rates and outages.

Oil dependence is yet another vulnerability. Libya, which has the largest proven reserves in Africa, has long relied on oil exports as its primary source of revenue. This pattern of reliance has resulted in a disproportionately large public sector, which employs 85 percent of the population and leaves the country severely exposed to future declines in oil prices caused by the transition to renewable energy and net-zero carbon pledges. Oil is also used to generate electricity, which is not only costly but contributes—along with the wasteful “flaring” or venting of gas during oil production—to Libya having the highest per-capita carbon emission rate in Africa.

At the height of the dictator Muammar Qaddafi’s ambitions, arable land comprised only 1.2 percent of the country’s territory and has since shrunk to less than 1 percent. The agricultural sector itself has been contracting steadily since the 2011 revolution, owing to the cumulative effects of conflict, supply chain disruptions, rising costs of agricultural supplies, and the lack of renewable water supplies.

And while it contributes to a miniscule portion of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), estimated at less than 2 percent in 2022, the agriculture sector continues to be a source of income for a not-insubstantial percentage of its inhabitants—estimated at 22 percent in 2020. Libya’s low agricultural output means that it is forced to import three-quarters of its foodstuffs, making the country extremely vulnerable to disruptions in global food supplies, including those resulting from climate change. Endemic government inattention to the agricultural sector has only worsened this dynamic. “They don’t prioritize it because they think it doesn’t contribute to the gross income,” noted a Libyan soil scientist in a telephone interview. “But if we lose local food production, we have food insecurity.”1

These vulnerabilities present an especially dire threat to the well-being and human security of people living in the sparsely populated regions of the Jabal Nafusa (Nafusa Mountains), also known as Jabal Gharbi, west of Tripoli; the southern Fezzan region; and the Jabal Akhdar (Green Mountains) in eastern Libya.

Here, climate shocks are being aggravated not only by environmental degradation but also by socioeconomic marginalization, political and intercommunal conflicts, and collapsing infrastructure. The cumulative impacts of these factors on food security and subsistence farming are a particular concern in these three areas, given that the Jabal Akhdar region produces half of all of Libya’s crops and the Jabal Nafusa region, its adjacent Jafara Plain, and the Fezzan grow the other half. Farmers interviewed in these regions were acutely aware of how climate change combines with political and socioeconomic problems, especially poor governance, to threaten their livelihood.

“The main factor is neglect,” noted one farmer in the Sidi Sayeh area south of Tripoli. “There is no oversight, no support, no investment in growing our capacity as farmers. Climate change adds another layer, but it is the juxtaposition of its effects with the lack of institutional oversight and support that will push farmers like me to leave behind their ancestral practices.”

It is not only farmers who are threatened in these areas. Migrants and refugees are especially at risk, given the proximity of some of these agricultural areas to borders and their resultant role in hosting displaced persons. So too are Libyan ethnolinguistic minorities, for whom climate change compounds preexisting grievances of discrimination. Workers in the informal sector, women, and children are also imperiled.

Understanding how climate change is affecting the well-being and livelihood of these at-risk populations is therefore essential for the crafting of a viable, more inclusive climate strategy, one that mobilizes local resources and knowledge to build better pathways for resilience—for all of Libya’s inhabitants.

The Climate-Governance-Misgovernance Nexus in Libya

Long-standing problems of governance, institutional fragmentation, political tensions, and recurring armed conflict have sharpened Libya’s vulnerability to climate change and also impeded a coherent government response to climate mitigation and adaptation.

The roots of the country’s climate fragility are found in Qaddafi’s poor management of resources and inefficient state-owned monopolies managing water and electricity. Added to this were Qaddafi’s overly ambitious agricultural schemes that saw the rapid depletion of coastal aquifers and a dependence on his much-touted megaproject, the GMMR. He often used the project politically, prioritizing access for favored communities and excluding others who were deemed less loyal.

His peculiar brand of socialist rule oversaw the collectivization of land in the mid-1980s, a process that removed existing legal safeguards on nature preserves and hastened the deforestation of the Green Belt around Tripoli and other cities, which for decades had contributed to a beneficial microclimate, slowed desertification, and stopped soil erosion.

Since Qaddafi’s death in 2011, a worsening spiral of factional conflict, corruption, infrastructural decay, and predation has left ever-greater numbers of people exposed to climate shocks. The chaos has also produced a profound lag in the country’s official response to climate change. Of the 196 signatories to the 2016 Paris Agreement, only Libya has not signed a Nationally Determined Contribution. And even though the country has established a renewable energy plan and has enormous potential for solar and wind energy, it has made little progress on these fronts, in part because of a lack of competitiveness in the private sector and bureaucratic resistance from state-owned monopolies.

Political fissures and elite rivalries are in no small measure to blame for this paralysis. The country is nominally ruled by a Government of National Unity (GNU), but in practice it is split between the Tripoli-based administration and Khalifa Haftar’s increasingly militarized administration in the east. Despite some climate-related cooperation and exchange of information, this split continues to hobble progress.

Even within the GNU, there has been competition over control of climate policy, most evident between the Ministry of the Environment and a climate authority within the prime minister’s office—though the two bodies have reportedly improved their collaboration and coordination.

Increasingly, key ministries and institutions have been taken over by armed groups, in both the east and west, which have further contributed to climate vulnerability through environmental predation, converting tracts of forests into more profitable money-laundering schemes like apartments, malls, and resorts, while also selling chopped-down trees as charcoal.

The effects of such predation, particularly acute in the western Jafara Plain and in the eastern Jabal Akhdar, have only worsened the effects of climate change, particularly for those Libyan citizens who make a living off the land.

“The consequences of climate change became more acute ever since they started breaking down the forests into smaller units, cutting the trees, and selling off the land,” noted a farmer in the southern environs of Tripoli.6 And although the agricultural police department that operates in both the east and west has publicized its crackdown on illegal clearing, it does not cross the red lines of dominant armed groups.

Elsewhere, Libya’s ability to build climate policy is hobbled by a dearth of qualified personnel, insufficient technical capacity, poor local data collection, poor collaboration between the government and universities, and a lack of local-level participation and activism.

Libyan municipalities in particular have important roles to play on climate change advocacy and awareness, but they have been frustrated by a lack of administrative, budgetary, and political support from the capital.8 Libya’s civil society is similarly constrained by a lack of support and increasingly repressive security measures from authorities in both the east and the west. This lack of support has had a chilling effect on climate activists.

These daunting structural and political problems will have profoundly negative consequences for the country’s ability to surmount the challenges of climate change—and they are felt acutely in the mountainous zone just west of the capital.

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Frederic Wehrey is a senior fellow in the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where his research focuses on governance, conflict, and security in Libya, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf.

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Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Georgetown Security Studies Review

The Wagner Group’s entrenched and increasingly overt operations in Libya reflect Russia’s strategic challenge to Western influence and its ambition to solidify its geopolitical power in North Africa. By backing Khalifa Haftar, Russia has leveraged private military contractors (PMCs) to exploit global distractions and Libya’s political disarray, cementing its presence in the Mediterranean and extending its reach into Sub-Saharan Africa.

The Wagner Group’s evolution from covert operations to a pronounced military role aligns with Russia’s broader objectives of controlling strategic resources and key geographic areas that can encircle Western powers and challenge them on multiple fronts. 

The Wagner Group’s History in Libya

Functioning as an instrument of Russian foreign policy, Wagner’s presence in Libya dates back to early 2017, initially involved in demining operations. Their significant engagement began in May 2018, with around 300 mercenaries aiding the LNA in various military operations. Wagner’s influence expanded during the LNA’s offensive to capture Tripoli in 2019, with substantial financial backing from the United Arab Emirates. Despite suffering setbacks due to Turkish military intervention supporting the Government of National Accord (GNA), Wagner shifted focus to defending strategic locations in eastern Libya, constructing defense lines, and collaborating with regional militias such as the Sudanese Janjaweed and Chadian militia FACT.

Throughout its operations, Wagner employed various advanced military tactics and equipment, including drones, anti-aircraft systems, and armored vehicles. Politically, Wagner has supported Khalifa Haftar and established contacts with Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, son of the late dictator Muammar Gaddafi, to influence Libyan politics in favor of Russia’s strategic interests. 

The Wagner Group’s expansion into North Africa, West Africa, and the Sahel has become a critical element of Russia’s foreign policy, which has expanded its footprint in the region by exploiting Libya’s political fragmentation. Despite the upheavals following the death of its founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner Group’s operations have been integral to the Kremlin’s support of General Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA).

For instance, during the Tripoli offensive in 2019, Wagner was accused of using illegal booby traps and land mines and recruiting Syrian fighters to bolster Haftar’s forces. In addition, Wagner has facilitated weapons transfers, established bases, and trained LNA forces, which has solidified Russia’s role as a dominant power in the region. Lastly, Libya’s geographic location, linking Niger, Chad, and Sudan to North Africa and Europe, makes it of vital strategic importance to the Kremlin. Indeed, Wagner’s involvement in Libya has facilitated Russia’s use of Libya as a logistical hub for operations extending into the Sahel and beyond and interference in unstable and war-torn countries like Niger and Sudan. 

As Libya remains divided between the UN-backed Government of National Unity (GNU) in Tripoli, led by Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, and a rival administration in Benghazi, dominated by Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA), Wagner’s alignment with Haftar has allowed the group to leverage Libya’s vast oil reserves and gold deposits in Africa, ranking among the world’s top fifty to reinforce Russia’s energy dominance across the Mediterranean and Sub-Saharan Africa.

This strategic alignment with Haftar allows Russia to control and influence one of the world’s most significant oil-producing regions. By securing access to Libya’s extensive oil reserves, Russia not only ensures a steady flow of energy resources but also gains leverage over global energy markets. This control can be used to manipulate oil prices, exert political pressure on oil-dependent nations, and create economic dependencies. Furthermore, by establishing a presence in Libya, Russia can potentially disrupt European energy supplies, particularly as Europe seeks to diversify its energy sources away from Russian gas.

General Averyanov’s Leadership and Expansion Strategy

Since Prigozhin’s death, the Wagner Group’s operations in Libya have increasingly come under the direct control of the Russian Defense Ministry, as the involvement of General Andrei Averyanov and Colonel General Yunus-Bek Yevkurov shows. As the de facto leader of the Wagner Group, General Averyanov has orchestrated a series of military and diplomatic initiatives across Libya.

Since his appointment, Averyanov has been implicated in high-profile operations, such as targeted killings of opposition leaders and orchestrating attacks aimed at destabilizing rival factions. These actions serve to weaken opposition to Haftar and consolidate Russian influence in Libya. Averyanov’s strategy involves orchestrating destabilization efforts to create chaos among anti-Haftar forces, thereby facilitating the Libyan National Army (LNA) to gain ground. His strategy has been instrumental in advancing Moscow’s geopolitical goals in the region by enhancing military training programs, securing key oil fields, and providing essential resources to support Haftar’s forces.​

In September 2023, Averyanov met with General Khalifa Haftar to solidify their alliance, followed by diplomatic trips to Mali, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic (CAR), and Niger. Under Averyanov’s command, analysts estimate several hundred to 2,000 Wagner operatives remain in Libya, with an additional 4,600 spread across sub-Saharan Africa. These contractors run three significant airbases in the oil-rich Sirte basin, in al-Jufra, and Brak al-Shati, facilitating the movement of goods and military supplies between allies in Sudan and other sub-Saharan regions. 

In April 2024, significant quantities of military equipment, including towed artillery, armored personnel carriers, and rocket launchers, were offloaded from Russian vessels at the port of Tobruk, sourced from the Russian-controlled port of Tartus in Syria. Further talks are underway to provide Russian warships with docking rights at Tobruk, enhancing military collaboration by exchanging air defense systems and training LNA pilots.

This expansion is part of a comprehensive strategy to boost Russia’s regional naval presence. The strategic location of Tobruk, near the Suez Canal and the Mediterranean, would effectively turn Libya into a critical operational base for Russia’s African and Mediterranean military and strategic actions. Additionally, granting Russian warships docking rights at the port of Tobruk would enable Russia to exert substantial control over Libyan airspace and project military power across the Mediterranean. 

Such a development would diminish Western influence in the region, undermining the strategic and operational flexibility of NATO and the EU while bolstering Russia’s ability to challenge and counteract Western geopolitical interests.

Averyanov’s initiatives have also enabled Haftar to exert significant influence over the civil war in Sudan by using bases under his control to ship weapons to Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF). These moves are part of Russia’s broader strategy to strengthen its military presence in Libya and exert influence across the Mediterranean and North Africa. By positioning itself as a formidable counterbalance to Western powers like NATO and the European Union, Russia aims to counter Western geopolitical interests in the region.

Implications for Regional Security and Western Response

The visible escalation of Russian activities in Libya presents a direct threat to Western interests and regional stability. Wagner Group’s operations now potentially include manipulating migration flows to Europe and restricting airspace rights, strategic moves that could enable Moscow to exert significant pressure on the European Union and NATO.

This manipulation is seen in Russia’s leveraging of migration through Libya, where the instability and human rights abuses in migrant detention centers contribute to a surge in migrants heading to Southern Europe, creating socio-political strain within the EU. The presence of the Wagner Group and its influence over local militias and detention centers exacerbate this humanitarian crisis. Research indicates that 20% of transit migrants in Libya come from countries like Eritrea, Somalia, and Sudan, which have high asylum acceptance rates in Europe.

To curb Wagner’s influence in Libya, the United States and its allies should implement a multi-faceted strategy. This may include enacting new legislation similar to the RICO Act to increase punitive measures against Wagner’s financial operations, thereby disincentivizing their presence by cutting off financial gains. Strengthening diplomatic ties with Libyan factions aligned with Western interests, particularly the Government of National Unity (GNU), and imposing targeted sanctions on key Russian figures will further limit Wagner’s support.

Additionally, enhancing NATO’s presence in the Mediterranean and providing military assistance to anti-Wagner factions in Libya could bolster local resistance. The evolving dynamics in Libya underscore the need for a coordinated international response to counterbalance Russia’s strategic maneuvers and mitigate its growing influence. Russia’s exploitation of Libya further demonstrates that its challenge to NATO is not confined to the Eastern flank but also aims at the Southern flank. Addressing Russia’s multifaced strategy is the best option for NATO to avoid a future multi-front confrontation with Russia.

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Mohamed Abaid

Power outages remain a significant global issue, affecting numerous countries and their populations. These interruptions can range from minor inconveniences to severe, prolonged disruptions that cripple essential services and economic activities. This report explores the causes, effects, and durations of recent power outages worldwide, and highlights how Libya, once plagued by frequent blackouts, has managed to stabilize its power grid under the leadership of Dr. Mohamed Al-Mashay and the General Electricity Company of Libya (GECOL).

Causes of Power Outages

Power outages can stem from various sources, including technical failures, adverse weather conditions, insufficient infrastructure, and geopolitical conflicts. Technical failures often involve breakdowns in critical components like transformers and transmission lines. Adverse weather, such as hurricanes, floods, and heatwaves, can cause direct damage to power infrastructure and increase electricity demand beyond supply. Many developing regions suffer from outdated infrastructure and inadequate maintenance, heightening the risk of outages. Additionally, geopolitical conflicts can disrupt fuel supplies necessary for power generation, leading to shortages.

Recent Global Instances of Power Outages

Southern Europe and the Balkans

In June 2024, a major power blackout hit Southern Europe, including the Balkans. Countries like Albania, Bosnia, Croatia, and Montenegro experienced significant disruptions due to a cascading grid failure. The blackout lasted several hours, causing widespread economic and social impacts as the interconnected nature of modern power grids means a fault in one area can affect multiple regions simultaneously.

Ecuador

Ecuador experienced a nationwide blackout in June 2024 due to a faulty transmission line. This outage, which lasted over three hours, disrupted healthcare, transportation, and commerce, highlighting the critical need for robust infrastructure and rapid response mechanisms.

Malta

Malta faced a nationwide blackout with unclear causes, underscoring the island’s vulnerability to power interruptions. Additionally, scheduled power outages were implemented in specific localities to manage grid stability and conduct essential maintenance.

Kenya

In Kenya, multiple counties experienced power interruptions due to scheduled maintenance by Kenya Power. Although planned, these interruptions caused significant inconvenience, emphasizing the challenges of maintaining an aging infrastructure amidst high demand.

West Africa

Ghana and other West African countries faced blackouts due to disruptions in gas supplies from Nigeria, crucial for power generation. Known locally as “dumsor,” these outages highlight the region’s dependency on fossil fuels and the impact of supply chain issues on electricity availability.

Effects of Power Outages

The effects of power outages are far-reaching, affecting societies and economies alike. Short-term impacts include disrupted daily activities, productivity loss, and potential damage to electrical appliances. Prolonged outages lead to more severe consequences such as food spoilage, disrupted medical services, and increased crime rates due to unlit streets and homes. Businesses suffer financial losses, and overall economic growth can be stunted. Additionally, frequent power cuts cause significant psychological stress on residents.

Libya’s Transformation

Amidst these global challenges, Libya stands out as a success story in stabilizing its power grid. Once notorious for chronic electricity shortages, Libya has made significant strides in recent years under the leadership of Dr. Mohamed Al-Mashay and GECOL.

Leadership and Initiatives

Dr. Mohamed Al-Mashay took charge as the Chairman of GECOL in 2022. Under his leadership, GECOL implemented various reforms to improve the reliability of the national electrical grid. One of the key initiatives was the distribution of 55,000 prepaid smart electricity meters, which helped reduce electricity theft, improve customer service, and facilitate renewable energy integration. GECOL plans to distribute 1.4 million meters over the next two years, enhancing revenue collection and reducing energy usage by 20%.

Increased Generation Capacity

Libya’s power generation capacity has increased significantly, reaching 8,200 megawatts (MW) in 2023, up from less than 6,000 MW in previous years. By summer 2024, the capacity is projected to reach 8,700 MW, ensuring a reliable power supply even during peak demand periods. This increase has been crucial in meeting the growing electricity demand and preventing the frequent blackouts that once plagued the nation.

Technological and Operational Improvements

GECOL has also focused on integrating renewable energy sources and improving grid management. The development of an app providing real-time information on scheduled power cuts and ways to reduce electricity demand has empowered consumers and improved grid stability. Additionally, GECOL’s extensive fiber optic network has been leveraged for telecommunications, generating additional revenue and reducing dependency on government subsidies.

Conclusion

While many countries continue to struggle with power outages, Libya’s turnaround offers a beacon of hope. The nation’s success in stabilizing its power grid and achieving a surplus of electricity sets a remarkable example. Through strategic leadership, technological innovations, and international partnerships, Libya has transformed from a country known for frequent blackouts to one with a reliable and robust electricity supply. This achievement underscores the potential for other nations to overcome their power challenges and ensure a stable, prosperous future for their citizens.

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The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

What are militant Islamists?

When searching for an appropriate explanation, it is first necessary to define the object of the analysis: militant Islamist movements. We are not simply looking at terrorism: the latter is one tactic among others that militant Islamist movements can potentially use – depending on the balance of power they find themselves in with their opponents.

The terms “extremism” and “radicalisation” also do not necessarily apply, because extremism is always relative: extreme in comparison to socially accepted ideas. The literature on radicalisation is mainly concerned with individuals, tight circles or small underground groups that isolate themselves from society.

The few existing studies of the decline of militant Islamist groups explicitly concentrate on terrorist groups. They emphasise military dynamics and aspects resulting from the strict isolation of these organisations from the societies that surrounded them.

In contrast, Libya’s militant Islamists developed largely openly in the first few years after 2011 and enjoyed considerable social acceptance. This is not the only reason why it makes sense to view them as social movements.

Social movement theory has long been applied to both violent and civilian Islamist groups; it also provides part of the conceptual toolkit for understanding the Libyan case. This includes the importance of political opportunity structures, access to resources that enable mobilisation, and the varying resonance of narratives and frames.

Analyses of Islamist movements fall into two camps when it comes to categorising them: those that emphasise the differences between various tendencies and those that group all Islamists together.

Social scientists in the first camp seek to differentiate between violent Islamists and moderate, civilian movements. They usually use the term “jihadism” for the former and “Islamism” or “political Islam” for the latter. In the second camp, authoritarian governments from the Persian Gulf to North Africa use “Islamists” and “terrorists” as interchangeable terms for all their political opponents.

In Western public discourse, right-wing social scientists and scholars of Islam also adopt this generalisation, and in countries such as Germany, the media and the authorities increasingly use “Islamist” as a synonym for “terrorist”.

There is no need to explain here that this equivalency is fundamentally wrong, regardless of whether it is based on political motivation or ignorance.

The term “jihadism” is ill-suited to adequately describing Libyan realities.

The term “militant Islamism,” as used in this study, distinguishes itself from both camps. Militant Islamism can be defined as violent mobilisation that is based on an Islamic idiom and pursues the declared aim of reshaping the political and social order. This definition is explicitly broader than the category of jihadism – a term that is itself rather controversial.

The use of “jihadism” generally assumes that this denotes a clearly defined doctrinal school – which, however, turns out to be incorrect on closer inspection. The Libyan context alone offers several examples of how ambivalent the term “jihadism” is: after all, the fight against Italian colonisation entered collective memory as a jihad and was mythologised as such by Gaddafi.

In the post-Gaddafi era, the supposed anti-Islamist Haftar and so-called Madkhalists in the ranks of his forces also called for jihad. And yet, the Madkhalists are reactionary Salafists whose doctrine above all emphasises absolute obedience to the ruler and is actually regarded by Islamic scholars as quietist, and hence incompatible with Salafist jihadism.

Due to their explicitly reactionary agenda, they do not fall under the definition of “militant Islamism,” whose period of decline in Libya was also that of the Madkhalists’ expansion. The fact that this study examines not only Salafist jihadist groups, but militant Islamism more broadly, is also due to Libyan realities. The country’s Salafist jihadist groups cannot be separated from other Islamist movements as easily as those who prefer to emphasise differences and nuances would suggest.

As this study shows, jihadist groups gained their initial strength not least from their many links with Islamists who were more flexible in their approach to ideology. Moreover, moderate, civilian Islamists such as the Muslim Brotherhood were evidently exposed to much the same dynamics as the militant forces, since the decline encompassed the entire Islamist spectrum. This also speaks in favour of not limiting the analysis to groups that were ideologically aligned with al-Qaeda or the Islamic State.

Methodology

This study identifies mechanisms at work in the expansion and decline of militant Islamist mobilisation as seen in Libya between 2011 and 2020. These mechanisms partly follow prevailing approaches, but go beyond them. They were developed from recurring patterns that the author discerned from 39 interviews. The interviewees included former leaders, members and allies of militant Islamist groups as well as other actors and observers who closely followed the rise and decline of such groups in their social environment.

The majority of these interviews were conducted in Libya and Istanbul in 2022–2023. By that time, militant Islamists were no longer relevant actors in the conflict. This enabled conversations that were generally more open and less characterised by politically motivated distortion than was the case when the groups in question were active. This is another reason why it can be advantageous to examine Islamist mobilisation after it has subsided.

Where the interviewees tended towards ex post facto rationalisation, the author was able to compare their assessments with his own, which he gained from discussions with the same groups of actors in the years following 2011 – at a time when militant Islamist groups were rapidly growing.

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Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Hafed Al-Ghwell

The recent European parliamentary elections have set the stage for interesting shifts in the bloc’s policies toward North Africa, a region that is increasingly pivotal, and not only for its proximity to Europe.

In recent years, North Africa has risen sharply in Western policy priorities owing to rapidly increasing roles in managing migration, bolstering European energy security, counterterrorism cooperation, regional stabilization, and climate change mitigation. Given the outcomes of these elections, it is critical to explore how EU-North Africa relations might evolve or prefer continuity in Europe’s approach toward its closest southern neighbors.

On migration, the changes in the European Parliament’s composition signal potential continuity of favoring stringent immigration controls, and increased reliance on externalization policies that empower North African countries to stem migration flows before they reach European shores. The policy aligns with existing practices, where the EU has sought to reinforce its borders indirectly through collaboration with third countries, coupled with financial incentives to bolster their capacity to deter migrations.

The sustainability of these policies, however, has come under intense scrutiny. Externalization has proven effective in reducing numbers, but it does not deal with the underlying causes of migration, such as instability, economic hardship, and climate change impacts that prevail both in origin countries, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, and transit countries, mainly in North Africa. The resulting policy framework thus risks perpetuating a cycle where short-term containment overshadows long-term solutions.

North African governments appear to have embraced their sharply expanding roles as gatekeepers of “Fortress Europe.” After all, the threat of a repeat of the 2015 crisis has and will continue to provide significant leverage in negotiations with Brussels.

The jury is still out on whether a continuation of the dynamic will eventually shift discussions toward more comprehensive partnerships that include investments in key sectors, infrastructure development, and climate resilience. However, with the current makeup of this next parliament, the EU will likely resist adopting more nuanced strategies beyond the current “contain first, answer later“’ approach, even when faced with continued migration pressures and heightened criticism from human rights groups.

On climate policy, the proposed outcomes and sentiments expressed in continental frameworks such as the European Green Deal make it clear that energy security and sustainability are taking on a new-found primacy in European policy circles. These are not just shaping the internal dynamics within the European bloc but also recalibrating extrinsic partnerships, particularly with its resource-endowed southern neighbor North Africa.

In turn, North African countries are keenly aware of the evolving energy narrative within the EU for various reasons. Aside from Algeria’s meteoric rise as an alternate supplier for disrupted Russian gas, there is also the region’s unmatched potential in solar and wind energy that makes it a pivotal player in the EU’s “greenification,” and mitigating the dependence on non-renewables.

Such a trajectory holds great promise for North African countries willing to harness this potential. A concerted move to establish clearer policy directives and bolster infrastructure can channel substantial EU investment into renewable projects — investment that can be a catalyst for broader economic revitalization and diversification within the region. 

However, while the EU’s policy shift toward the green transition and the enshrined goals such as net-zero emissions by 2050 stand as a testament to its commitment to addressing climate change, this shift is not without its complexities.

The impetus toward a green transition, while supported by some European political factions, faces resistance from others, particularly from sectors with entrenched interests in traditional energy sources or those that perceive environmental regulations as threatening to economic competitiveness. Such actions have a direct bearing on the magnitude and pace of green investment flows, and by extension, the benefits to North Africa.

Moreover, the greening of European economies is likely to prompt a systemic shift in global energy markets. North African countries, therefore, perceive the existential necessity not only to align with this transition but also to integrate into the emerging green value chains — motivated by opportunities to create new industries, jobs, and economic diversification.

Simultaneously, North African states are disproportionately affected by climate impacts, such as water scarcity and agricultural disruptions, which worsen existing vulnerabilities. Arguably, a deeper collaboration with the EU on climate finance and technology transfers presents not just a route to economic development but also a way to bolster climate resilience — a synergy that dovetails with both EU’s foreign policy aspects of the Green Deal and North Africa’s overall development in future.

In light of security recalibrations in the Sahel, notably the termination of the EU Training Mission in Mali and other missions in Niger, the bloc insists that it will remain a steadfast security partner to Africa. Despite withdrawals from specific operations in the Sahel due to the region’s political instability and the arrival of competing security entities such as Russian mercenaries, the EU’s resolve to engage with African nations on security matters, notably through new civilian-military missions, signals a flexible approach to tackling transnational threats.

North African policymakers are also cognizant of these shifts. Approaches that combine direct military training with broader, capacity-building missions align with both current and future efforts to bolster regional stability and counter threats that could spill over from the Sahel. This operational reshaping indicates European readiness to adapt its security strategies to political changes within its territories and external geopolitical fluctuations, shoring up its role as a critical security partner for a region that sits right next to a volatile Sahel and Horn of Africa.

Lastly, on democratization, the EU’s stance has evolved toward democracy support — a noticeable pivot from an assertive democratization agenda — to safeguard democratic spaces in restrictive contexts. The recalibrated strategy is less about exporting a specific democratic model and more focused on preserving the civic freedoms necessary for democracy to breathe.

The change signifies a recognition of the complexities inherent in supporting democracy in environments where political repression and challenges to civic freedoms are prevalent. Thus, the EU will likely increasingly favor initiatives that strengthen the resilience of civil society, rather than pushing for immediate political transformations.

In sum, the trajectory of EU-North Africa relations in the wake of European parliamentary elections presents a complex interplay of continuity and potential shifts. Understanding these dynamics is crucial for navigating existing challenges and leveraging opportunities to redefine the region’s engagement with Europe. Future strategies should remain nuanced, aiming to balance national interests with collaboration in areas of shared threats, from energy security to climate action, while pursuing a migration agenda that respects dignity and promotes development.

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Hafed Al-Ghwell is a senior fellow and executive director of the North Africa Initiative at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC.

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The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

Who were the Islamists?

Part of the answer to the question of how to explain the sudden disappearance of Libya’s militant Islamists is that many supposed Islamists never actually were as such. After 2011, numerous political actors and media in Libya and the wider region used “Islamist” as a stigmatic term.

Political opponents were branded as Islamists in order to discredit them. It was commonplace to label someone a Muslim Brother or to slander them as an al-Qaeda member without any basis. International media, diplomats and analysts often adopted such categorising.

Numerous articles stated, for example, that the paramilitary Libya Shield Forces were close to the Muslim Brotherhood or that Misrata’s armed groups were Islamist – both of which were simply false.

This misrepresentation repeated from one article to the next became widely accepted fact. The struggle over the conflict’s narratives that drove this dynamic was particularly virulent during the second civil war in 2014–2015.

In the 2019–2020 war over Tripoli, pro-Haftar propagandists once again tried to stigmatise their opponents as Islamists and terrorists. Since Haftar’s defeat, there has been much less recourse to such propaganda, thereby strengthening the impression that the influence of Islamists in Libya has greatly diminished. In fact, however, this influence had previously been excessively inflated.

Nevertheless, this development only partially explains why militant Islamists were in the spotlight until 2016 and have almost completely disappeared from it since 2020. In addition to fabrications and often inaccurate reporting, there has also been an actual rise and fall in militant Islamist movements.

What requires explanation, then, is why many actors maintained close ties with militant Islamists in the first few years after 2011, which in turn made it easier for their opponents to brand them Islamists as well, before increasingly distancing themselves from Islamists from 2015 onwards.

Analyses of Militant Islamist Mobilisation – and the Libyan Puzzle

Over the past two decades, both social science research and policy-oriented analysis has dealt extensively with the question of how and why militant Islamist movements spread. By contrast, how to explain their decline has rarely been the subject of investigation. And yet whether or not explanations for militant Islamism are valid should also be examined in terms of whether they can account for its decline. Prevailing approaches to explaining militant Islamist mobilisation differ primarily in how they assess the role of ideology as compared to other drivers of mobilisation.

Simplistic positions, which either declare ideology to be the most important factor or reject it altogether, no longer dominate the academic debate. Another theoretical divide is also gradually being overcome: between the tendency to dismiss ideology as merely an instrument in the hands of elites and the assumption that members of ideologically defined groups are ‘true believers’ whose actions are guided by their beliefs.

A number of studies show that ideology can fulfil these two functions and more within the same organisation. Among politicians and security authorities, however, the vague concept of radicalisation is still very popular, and is often associated with a strong focus on ideology.

Nuanced academic approaches, on the other hand, view the internalisation of extremist ideology as one aspect of radicalisation processes that are often driven more by social isolation and violent confrontation. Nevertheless, it is widely assumed that ideological socialisation and indoctrination make militant Islamist groups particularly tough and resilient.

The very category of a “jihadist group” implies that this is a sui generis actor whose peculiarity lies in the particularly important role of ideology. Some detect an “extremist’s advantage” in using ideology to strengthen trust between members of an armed group and thus also its fighting power.

Fewer analysts note that the proportion of hardened ideologues varies considerably from one group to the next. Conventional wisdom would therefore suggest that ideology gives militant Islamists in Libya cohesion, making them an extraordinarily tenacious political and military force. The sudden decline of militant Islamist groups then raises the question of what role ideology actually played in these groups.

This is relevant beyond the case of Libya. During the same period, the formerly flourishing jihadist movement in neighbouring Tunisia also rapidly lost popularity. The other analytical school also reaches the limits of its explanatory power with the Libyan case: the school that focuses on non-ideological drivers of jihadist mobilisation.

Over the past two decades, it has been common among social scientists, think tanks and non-governmental organisations to see the recruitment and mobilisation successes of jihadist groups primarily as a symptom of fundamental political and social grievances. Arbitrary repression by authoritarian regimes radicalises opposition groups – for example in prisons where young people who have been unjustly arrested are imprisoned together with committed ideologues.

Policy-oriented analyses of jihadist groups as parties to civil wars often emphasise that the rise of these groups can be explained by tactical alliances or by the search for protection against state security forces and their foreign supporters.23 They stress that the counterterrorism campaign of the USA and allied states after 2001 proved extremely counterproductive due to the civilian harm it caused; indeed, it provided jihadists with a “recruitment bonanza”. In the states of the Sahel, identity-based persecution drove entire population groups into the arms of jihadists.

Socio-economic grievances and resentment of economic orders that are perceived as unjust, as well as financial incentives, are also cited as important factors in joining jihadist groups. Accordingly, the fight against these groups primarily requires tackling the fundamental drivers of conflicts as well as building a fairer, more effective state.

There is extensive empirical evidence of links between the perception of arbitrary or collective threats and successful recruitment by jihadist groups. This does not detract from the fact that certain conditions can reverse such correlations, for example if the state’s capacity for repression is so strong that even massive injustice does not encourage militant mobilisation, but rather inhibits it.

And yet, developments in Libya suggest that such explanations ignore important aspects. After all, Libya’s militant Islamists underwent rapid expansion in the first two years after the fall of Gaddafi, when the conflicts had not yet escalated, but when Islamists were no longer subject to repression either.

Above all, however, conflicts continued to rage in Libya in the years after 2016, even as militant Islamist movements grew increasingly marginalised as actors in these conflicts. Contrary to general expectations, the latter also applied to the war over Tripoli in 2019.

And Libya is not an isolated case: in conflicts such as in Somalia or Iraq, jihadists gained importance at times when they offered themselves as allies to other actors and lost this importance once again when they became a threat to their allies. Both ideology and conflict dynamics therefore provide insufficient explanations for the decline of militant Islamist movements in Libya.

***

Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Africa Defense Forum

Russia is exploiting politically divided Libya, with its abundant natural resources, to exert more influence on the continent, especially in the Sahel region, a recent report said.

The Kremlin’s work will be headed by Africa Corps, formerly known as the Wagner Group, which will be based in Libya. The group plans to spread a new form of “Russian colonialism,” according to a recent report by the Royal United Services Institute.

“The Russian playbook has been remarkably consistent for decades,” the report said. “The overall approach is to use information operations and active measures to polarize a target population, mobilize factions in support of allied elites and paralyze support for opposing elements of a country’s leadership.”

In Libya, Russia continues to support Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, the Libyan National Army leader based in Benghazi. Haftar is committed to seizing Tripoli and toppling Libya’s internationally recognized Government of National Accord.

“The objectives of Wagner in Libya have been mainly to get access to oil revenues more or less indirectly through supporting Haftar’s armed forces, but also to ensure that it can access the broader African continent,” Tim Eaton, senior research fellow at the London-based Chatham House, told Deutsche Welle. “In that sense, Libya has been functioning as a bridgehead.”

In mid-April, Africa Corps fighters and 6,000 tons of military equipment began arriving via cargo planes at Brak al-Shati in southern Libya and cargo ships at Tobruk. Russia also plans to build a naval base at Tobruk, where its operatives could influence traffic across the Mediterranean, expand smuggling and perhaps disrupt shipping.

The mercenaries also support Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the country’s protracted civil war. They have been transporting portable surface-to-air missiles, ammunition, fuel and other cargo from Libya to the RSF, according to the German Institute for Global and Area Studies.

“While Africa Corps appears to be the sharp end of Russia’s security strategy in the turbulent Sahel region, its long-term goal will undoubtedly be to expand its influence across Africa,” wrote Institute for Security Studies researcher Nicodemus Minde.

After meeting with Haftar last year, Africa Corps head Gen. Andrei Averyanov visited Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, Mali and Niger to offer security in exchange for access to the region’s abundant natural resources. Russia has extracted $2.5 billion worth of gold from Africa in the past two years, which is likely to help fund its war in Ukraine, according to the Blood Gold Report.

In February, the mercenaries took control of Mali’s Intahaka gold mine, near the Burkina Faso border. Various armed groups disputed Northern Mali’s largest artisanal mine for years. Authorities recently rewrote Mali’s mining code to give the ruling junta more control over natural resources.

“In Niger, the Russians are endeavoring to gain a similar set of concessions that would strip French access to the uranium mines in the country,” Jack Watling, land warfare specialist at the Royal United Services Institute and lead author of its report, told the BBC.

Russia’s military presence has obvious benefits for junta-led countries, according to Edwige Sorgho-Depagne, an analyst of African politics at Amber Advisers. The juntas were initially transitional leaders who were supposed to organize elections “and bring about a return to democratic institutions,” Sorgho-Depagne told the BBC. “But now Russian paramilitaries are brought in to protect the military junta, allowing them to stay as long as they want.”

Africa Corps does not operate only in junta-led states. In the Central African Republic, Russian mercenaries have for years made capturing the country’s diamond market a priority, stealing and smuggling the precious gems while killing anyone who gets in their way.

Under Averyanov, two CAR companies — Mining Industries and Logistique Economique Etrangere — now stand accused of enabling the group’s security operations and illicit mining activities.

***

The Africa Defense Forum (ADF) magazine is a security affairs journal that focuses on all issues affecting peace, stability, and good governance in Africa. ADF is published by the U.S. Africa Command.

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Jonathan M. Winer

Combat terrorism with technical training

While Russia provides weapons and training to African military forces facing down threats from insurgencies or terrorist groups, the NATO report suggests the Alliance should largely limit itself to providing harm-mitigation techniques, such as training on how to identify improvised explosive devices and drones or how to gather evidence on the battlefield.

More compelling support may be possible on a bilateral basis from NATO member states to trusted regional governments. But for NATO itself, providing any hard assistance to southern partners ruled by coup-leaders is likely to be difficult at best.

Counter Russian disinformation

The May experts’ report notes that much of the Global South has a negative impression of NATO in the aftermath of the Alliance’s 2011 air campaign over Libya, NATO’s 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, the perception of double-standards on Ukraine versus Gaza, and the belief that the West has not paid much attention to the South’s needs.

To respond, the report suggests that the transatlantic bloc invite more people from Africa to NATO summits and high-level events, promote media literacy, as well as undertake a “Facts for Peace” initiative, which would provide education and training to regional journalists and social media influencers actively fighting disinformation.

Strengthen NATO’s “Hub for the South”

In 2016, NATO created a dedicated focal point for NATO member states on North Africa, the Sahel, Sub-Saharan Africa, and the Middle East in the form of the Strategic Direction-South HUB (NSD-S HUB) at the NATO Joint Force Command, based in Naples, Italy.

This institution has been operational since 2018 and is tasked with working with civil society to “understand” and then “engage.” Yet according to the report, the NSD-S HUB and its activities remain “disconnected from the rest of the NATO ecosystem” and have little impact.

It recommends integrating the NSD-S HUB’s policy development work with the actual political outreach NATO should initiate vis-à-vis its southern neighbors as well as taking basic steps like encouraging NATO members to send people to the NSD-S HUB who speak relevant languages and have some knowledge of the region. Such basic recommendations reflect NATO’s failure to date to prioritize this macro-region in practice, even after deciding to create an organ within Join Force Command specifically dedicated to engaging it.

Baby steps

To counter Russia’s adverse influence and activities across Africa — exemplified and often spearheaded by Moscow’s employment of the Africa Corps — NATO would necessarily need to be empowered to carry out military activities across the continent in a range of areas that would matter to the military and/or political leaders of the relevant target countries. Members of NATO do this bilaterally already.

The French have long had a range of military relationships in francophone Africa. It is precisely the cratering of these partnerships — with the growing number of African coup leaders being unwilling to be lectured by human rights-monitoring Westerners — that helped create the vacuum Russia has been delighted to fill, in the process dislodging the United States and other allies from key spots in the Sahel.

In response, the NATO experts’ report would have the Alliance begin to take actions it might have taken years ago if its political leadership had been paying greater attention. Eight years ago, few would have predicted that Russia could move in as quickly and comprehensively throughout Africa as it has done. Now there is widespread recognition of the threat posed by the destabilizing Russian expansion in Africa, to NATO, its members, and the African region.

In its upcoming summit, NATO should bless its experts’ recommendations to build a foundation for a more serious future role in its southern neighborhood. But their limited recommendations make obvious the need for the Alliance’s member states to engage far more comprehensively with North Africa and the Sahel, using institutions and arrangements that go well beyond whatever NATO as an organization may be in a position to do.

A viable strategic effort will require thought on what additional actions the West might take, through multiple institutions and mechanisms, working with Africans institutions, African states, and African civil society to counter the Russian presence, thereby creating renewed opportunities for better local governance, greater economic and social opportunities, and longer-term human security and political stability.

Closing Russia’s Libyan gateway

Neither NATO nor the wider West can counter Africa’s turn toward warlordism, or the Russian role in exacerbating and exploiting that trend via its neo-colonialist Africa Corps, without taking on the problem posed by Libyan disunity and competing militia chieftains.

This will require Western governments to undertake a tough-minded, urgent, and focused strategy backed by visible concrete action calculated to unify Libya and to enable the North African country to expel its foreign military forces — beginning with the Russians, but including the Turks and any other foreign occupying force. That’s one initiative where NATO members and their partners in the Middle East and North Africa could align. A unified Libya that no longer incubates a Russian military presence could do a lot to help counter the trend of junta rule in the Sahel and the insecurity and instability that radiates out from it.

***

Jonathan M. Winer, a Non-Resident Scholar at the Middle East Institute, was the US Special Envoy and Special Coordinator for Libya from 2014 to 2016 as well as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Law Enforcement.

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The Middle East Institute (MEI)

Russia expressed regret over the lack of progress in the unification of Libya, attributing it to “conflicts of private and external interests and the ineffectiveness of international mediation”

Back and forth between the United States and Russia at the United Nations Security Council on Libya, while the position of UN envoy remains vacant. The first briefing at the UN Headquarters of the interim head of the United Nations Support Mission (UNSMIL) in Libya, the American Stephanie Khoury, saw a long-distance exchange of accusations between representatives of Moscow and Washington, respectively Anna Evstigneeva e Robert A. Wood.

The first accused the West and NATO of committing an “illegal attack” on Libya in 2011, triggering a chain reaction that has led to the “very tense and turbulent” situation now.

The US diplomat described the recent arrival of Russian military ships at the port of Tobruk as a “particularly worrying” episode. Meanwhile, for his part, Khoury outlined a first account of his two months as UN correspondent in place of the resigning Abdoulaye Bathily, explaining that Libyan politicians are – at least in words – in agreement on the need to go to elections, but not on how to vote.

Russia expressed regret over the lack of progress in Libya’s unification, attributing it to “conflicts of private and external interests and the ineffectiveness of international mediation.”

Evstigneeva – responsible for political affairs of the Russian permanent representation at the Glass Palace – declared that the international community and the United Nations must play a central role in the Libyan unification process, but that progress was prevented by external vested interests and will of local subjects to maintain the status quo and the partial collapse of the state.

To overcome this situation, Evstigneeva emphasized the importance of holding national elections and resolving controversial issues related to electoral legislation, hoping for an agreement between interested parties that is in everyone’s interest. Russia said legislative and presidential elections should be held simultaneously to ensure the success of the national reconciliation process, praising the African Union’s efforts to organize a conference on this issue.

The Russian representative expressed concern about the position of armed groups in western Libya, underlining the need to unify the Libyan armed authorities and include security forces in state bodies.

Evstigneeva warned that the continuation of the current state could encourage the activity of extremist and terrorist groups in the Sahel and Sahara region. The Russian representative also expressed concern about plans by external parties to create and supply militias on the border with Libya, arguing that such operations do not favor the unification of the armed forces, but only respond to national interests.

The Russian diplomat called for the cessation of the supply of destabilizing weapons and the end of the presence of mercenaries, a practice in force in Libya since the beginning of the conflict in 2011. Finally, she took note of the decision of the Sanctions Committee to lift the ban on trip imposed on some members of the family of Muammar Gaddafi.

US diplomat Wood has a completely different opinion, according to which the circulation of counterfeit Libyan dinars printed in Russia has increased turbulence in the markets and political divisions in the North African country, while the arrival of Russian ships supplying military equipment is ” particularly worrying.”

Wood praised the renewal of the arms embargo in Libya implemented by the European air and naval mission Irini, which plays a role considered “essential” to monitor the Libyan coasts and counter violations of the arms embargo. The US representative appreciated the work of the International Sanctions Committee expert group on Libya and expressed concern about Russian ships supplying military equipment to Libya.

The US representative also underlined the United States’ commitment to using sanctions to deter threats to peace and security in Libya. Wood praised the work of the Joint Military Committee “5+5” to protect the borders and reduce criminal acts in the south of the country.

In the economic sphere, Wood recalled that the United States imposed sanctions on the Russian company Goznak for printing the equivalent of a billion dollars in counterfeit Libyan currency, worsening Libya’s economic challenges.

Two military ships of the Russian Federation, escorted by two submarines, made an official stop in recent days at the naval base of Tobruk, in Cyrenaica, the eastern region of Libya.

The news was reported by the press office of the self-proclaimed Libyan National Army (LNA), led by the general Khalifa Haftar. “In order to strengthen relations between the General Command of the Libyan National Army and the Russian Federation, a group of Russian warships, consisting of the missile cruiser Varyag and the frigate Marshal Shaposhnikov, paid a three-day visit to the base naval base in Tobruk, after a visit to the Arab Republic of Egypt,” we read in an ENL statement published on Facebook together with some images of the Udaloy class frigate and part of the Russian Pacific Fleet, and of the Varyag cruiser.

“The visit is part of concrete steps to strengthen cooperation between Russia and Libya, restore long-standing friendly relations and take advantage of Russian expertise to strengthen the sovereignty and independence of the Libyan state and its armed forces,” adds the party Libyan. Rumors have been circulating for some time about Russia’s intention to open a naval base in the Cyrenaica city.

Furthermore, at least five significant weapons deliveries occurred in April, all made by the Russian Navy through the port of Tobruk. It is no coincidence that Libya’s representative to the United Nations, the ambassador Al Taher el Sonni, stated that external interference is the main cause of his country’s crisis.

The diplomat criticized the UN Security Council for failing to identify a single individual, organization or group responsible for hindering a comprehensive solution to the crisis in Libya. El Sonni declared that it is time for Libyans to decide their fate for themselves: “We are tired of stagnation and lessons on what we should do. We are tired of Libya being used by other countries. We decide our future ourselves.”

The diplomat stressed that “the time has come for Libyans to decide their fate without interference from the United Nations”, calling for the political process to be completed where it had been interrupted and for a new UN envoy to Libya to be appointed after Bathily’s resignation.

The ambassador highlighted the importance of bringing Libyan parties together, finding points of agreement and “developing an electoral road map and a specific electoral program based on shared electoral laws”, underlining that the Libyan people are suffering due to the current situation.

On the issue of security, the Libyan representative stated that “first of all, all foreign military forces must be removed from Libyan territory”, adding that it is essential to support the 5+5 Joint Military Committee to achieve this goal.

Today’s Libya is administered by two rival political-military coalitions: on the one hand the Prime Minister’s Government of National Unity based in Tripoli Abdulhamid Dabaiba, recognized by the international community and supported above all by Türkiye, a member of NATO; on the other, the so-called Government of National Stability led by Osama Hammad, prime minister designated by the House of Representatives, in effect a parallel executive based in Benghazi managed by General Haftar.

To break the political stalemate, former UN envoy Bathily launched, on February 27 last year, a plan to draft the constitutional amendments and electoral laws necessary to hold “free, inclusive and transparent” elections by 2023 However, this plan failed and Bathily resigned on April 16th.

Meanwhile, according to the French news website “Africa Intelligence”, three personalities from Algeria, Germany and Mauritania are vying for the position of new special envoy to Libya.

The German diplomat Christian Buck, director general for Political Affairs at the German Foreign Ministry and special envoy for Libya, is among the favorite candidates, although the political dynamics in the United Nations Security Council could limit his possibilities, especially after the nomination of the American Khoury as deputy UN special representative in the North African country.

Another name is that of Ramtane Lamamra, 72 years old, former Algerian Foreign Minister and current special representative of the UN secretary general in Sudan. Algeria, which has a non-permanent seat on the Security Council, has increased its influence within the United Nations, where it is represented by the ambassador Ammar Ben Jama, very active on the issue of the Gaza Strip. However, according to the French website, Lamamra did not maintain close relations with the President of the Republic, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, since the head of state fired him and replaced him with Ahmad Attaf.

The third prominent candidate is Mauritanian Mohamed al Hassan Ould Labat, law professor who currently serves as Chief of Staff to the President of the African Union Commission, Moussa Fakih Mahamat. However, again according to “Africa Intelligence”, Ould Labat does not enjoy the support of the Mauritanian president, Mohamed Ould Ghazouani, and would struggle to gain support within the United Nations or the African Union. He would therefore rely on the support of the Congolese president, Denis Sassou Nguesso, who chairs the African Union’s high-level committee on Libya which has close relations with the Libyan Presidential Council. Antonio Guterres, secretary general of the UN, has not yet given priority to the appointment of Bathily’s successor, while the American Khoury is acting as interim envoy (but with limited powers).

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The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

The Rise and Fall of Militant Islamists in Libya, 2011–2020

After the fall of Gaddafi in 2011, a flourishing landscape of militant Islamist groups developed in Libya. In one city after another, such groups burst into the open, took over security functions and forged alliances with other militias amidst escalating power struggles. Radical splinter groups developed into powerful Libyan offshoots of the Islamic State and made Sirte the capital of its “Tripolitania province” in 2015.

At the time, it seemed as if jihadist groups in Libya were destined for a promising future. However, just as quickly as they had spread, militant Islamists disappeared from Libya’s landscape of actors. Armed groups on both sides of the Libyan power struggle drove IS out of the cities. Former allies soon distanced themselves from less radical Islamist groups, which found themselves increasingly isolated and rapidly losing influence.

Militant Islamists no longer play a role among the forces that have dominated Libyan politics since the war for Tripoli ended in June 2020. The spread of militant Islamism in Libya had some deep roots. A considerable number of Libyans had travelled to Afghanistan to fight from the end of the 1980s.

In the 1990s, some of them founded the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which fought repeated battles with the Gaddafi regime from 1995 to 1998 before its members were either imprisoned or fled abroad. After the US invasion of Iraq, Libyans made up a disproportionate share of the foreign fighters there. Many of them came from only a few Libyan cities, some of which had already been LIFG strongholds.

Even then, a jihadist subculture had developed in a few Libyan cities. During the first civil war (2011), militant Islamists were part of the revolutionary forces. They did not form their own jihadist groups, but fought side by side with non-Islamist revolutionaries. With the fall of Gaddafi, they not only became victors, but also established solid relationships with other revolutionaries.

After the revolutionaries’ victory, former LIFG leaders and militant Islamists without affiliation became members of parliament and deputy defence or interior ministers. Others set up armed groups that obtained official status and access to state funds. In this respect, Islamist actors were no different from other former revolutionaries.

Although the former LIFG leaders were now often vilified as “al-Qaeda” or “terrorists” by their political opponents, there was no evidence that they continued to pursue a jihadist agenda. Instead, they founded parties and dedicated themselves to building a state according to their ideas of Islamic principles – which were basically in line with the conservative social consensus in Libya.

At the same time, the militant Islamist spectrum began to differentiate itself. Jihadists who were ideologically aligned with al-Qaeda founded groups under the name Ansar al-Sharia in several cities in 2012.

These and other groups channelled recruits from Libya and other North African countries to Syria, where they joined the Nusra Front and later the Islamic State. In Benghazi and Darna, the murder of former army officers and intelligence officers became increasingly frequent.

Although these cases were never solved and presumably had various contexts, suspicion fell on Ansar al-Sharia and other jihadists, who were particularly active in those cities. However, Ansar al-Sharia retained a remarkable degree of social acceptance, for example by providing security for Benghazi’s main hospital or campaigning against drug use.

The second civil war (2014–2015) gave militant Islamists an enormous boost. In Benghazi, former revolutionaries formed an alliance with Ansar al-Sharia to fight against the armed groups led by the renegade officer Khalifa Haftar. Haftar’s opponents in western Libya, above all the armed groups of Misrata, supported the alliance with Ansar al-Sharia in Benghazi politically, in the media and logistically. Local branches of the Islamic State were formed in Benghazi and Darna.

They benefited from the fact that Haftar’s opponents initially did not fight them, as they did not want to open two fronts simultaneously. For similar reasons, the Islamic State succeeded in bringing Sirte under its control: The city lay between the frontlines, and neither Misrata’s armed groups nor their opponents to the east of Sirte wanted to devote valuable resources to occupying it. IS was therefore able to operate and recruit openly. Many of Haftar’s opponents minimised the IS problem and also played down the danger posed by extremists in their own camp.

Haftar’s opponents initially did not fight the Islamic State – until it became too great a threat.

The turning point came when IS finally became too great a threat. In September 2015, former revolutionaries in Darna – including militant Islamists – declared war on the IS offshoot there. This confrontation ended in April 2016 with the defeat and flight of the remaining IS fighters. In Sabratha, where IS had not openly appeared but was increasingly committing murders and kidnappings, local armed groups used a US airstrike in February 2016 to drive IS out of the city, amidst battles lasting several days.

IS’s attempts to expand from Sirte – by far the group’s largest presence in Libya – towards Misrata triggered a major offensive by Misratan armed groups in May 2016. In December 2016, they captured the last streets in Sirte where IS was still holding out. These confrontations made it impossible for Haftar’s opponents to continue to trivialise the danger posed by extremists.

The result was an extensive distancing from militant Islamists.8 The IS presence in Benghazi ended when its fighters fled the city in January 2017, by which time Ansar al-Sharia had effectively ceased to exist as an organisation. Other opponents of Haftar in Benghazi continued to fight until their defeat in December 2017. Many IS members who had escaped from the cities into the desert of central and southern Libya fell victim to American airstrikes.

The last eastern Libyan city outside Haftar’s control was Darna. As in Benghazi, not all his opponents in Darna were militant Islamists – but the latter formed the committed core, which was only defeated in February 2019 after an almost year-long battle. This meant that both the Islamic State and several other militant Islamist groups had been militarily defeated. Foreign analysts, however, continued to stress the potential danger of renewed jihadist mobilisation.

Libya remained politically divided, and violence and repression by Haftar’s forces and other militias did not create lasting security, but instead a breeding ground for new radicalisation. When Haftar attacked Tripoli in April 2019, triggering a third civil war, many well-informed observers warned that the conflict – like the one in Benghazi – would give a new impetus to jihadist mobilisation. But this did not happen.

Militant Islamists played no role in the fourteen-month war. Individual fighters may have had links to militant Islamist groups in earlier phases of the conflict, but now they were fighting in militias that rejected Islamist ideology. The leaders of these organisations ensured that figures who were – often wrongly – labelled as extremists were kept away from their units.

Even after Haftar’s defeat and the end of the war over Tripoli, militant Islamists were unable to regain any significant influence. Perhaps most surprisingly, there were hardly any signs of continued underground mobilisation, no splinter groups that remained wedded to the armed struggle for an Islamic state according to their own ideas. Militant Islamism appeared to have been defeated not only militarily, but also ideologically and morally – at least for the time being.

***

Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper – June 2024 – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Jonathan M. Winer

NATO’s nascent response

Long before initiating his current invasion of Ukraine, Putin understood the geopolitical significance of Africa and smelled the opportunity provided by the ongoing neglect of the region by the West.

He used a range of diplomatic and economic tools as well as military ones, starting with offers of various Wagner “private military” services, to initiate partnerships with the new class of African warlords who were taking over much of North Africa and the Sahel.

That work continues at the highest levels of the Russian government, as reflected in Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s recent tour of Guinea, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burkina Faso, and Chad.

With this as a predicate, in May, just ahead of its July 2024 summit in Washington, the North Atlantic Alliance released a major study on what NATO might do to engage with the Middle East, North Africa, Sahel, and Sub-Saharan Africa to counter the interconnected “root causes of insecurity, terrorism, and instability,” which start with “climate change, fragile institutions, health emergencies and food insecurity.”

The 33-page experts report, whose contributors included US special envoy for Libya and former ambassador to the country Richard Norland, provides a potpourri of 114 concrete recommendations for the transatlantic bloc, which are meant to inform the development of NATO’s first official “Southern Strategy.”

Of particular note for the discussion of Russian influence in Africa, the preparatory document expressly states that Russia has been both fueling and benefiting from the continent’s vulnerabilities by offering an “alternative ‘non-democratic’ and ‘non-accountable’ model.”

Additionally, it suggests that, ultimately, NATO will need to find ways to cooperate with its “southern partners” without requiring them to converge on the bloc’s values. So how should NATO operationalize this advice?

Assessing where the Alliance must go from here

Start talking with Africa

To begin with, the May experts’ report recommends, with urgency, that NATO and those prospective southern partners at least engage in greater dialogue. The first 10 short-term recommendations boil down to having NATO declare that its southern neighborhood is important (a political message that “we care, we really care”);

(a) that its senior officers spend more time visiting these countries;

(b) that NATO convene a special NATO-African summit and other processes for political dialogue and consultations; and

(c) that the Alliance engage with “parliaments, media, civil society and youth in the region and invite scholars and think-tankers from the regions to expert briefings at NATO headquarters.”

While these are surely useful activities, such NATO-African chats are unlikely to be transformational anytime soon.

Support the Libyan political process

The report notes Libya’s contribution to regional instability but limits its recommendations to supporting efforts to unify the country, form a single national military force, and regain sovereign control of Libyan borders.

How NATO is to do any of those things is left unstated, beyond providing Libyans with advice on defense and security institution building. (In 2014-2016, this author personally witnessed representatives of NATO vainly seeking to secure Libyan engagement on these issues, with absolutely no success whatsoever.)

The lack of any concrete Alliance action vis-à-vis Libya is perplexing, especially since Russia’s foothold there has been foundational for the Kremlin’s success throughout Africa.

As reflected in the aforementioned mid-June deployment of Russian destroyers to Libyan ports, Moscow’s use of this country’s territory to develop a north-south transcontinental logistics network is continuing to grow and intensify.

Find ways to engage in the Sahel and Sub-Saharan Africa

The report’s recommendations on the Sahel are even weaker than its woefully inadequate recommendations on Libya. The text details the deteriorating security situation throughout the region, marked by terrorism, violent extremism, political violence, organized crime, irregular migration and human trafficking, and poor governance, all of which are exacerbated by environmental stresses and explosive population growth.

In response, bedeviled by the diverging values of the current crew of African leaders in the Sahel from those of NATO, the report’s experts make only a few modest, and clearly insufficient, recommendations.

These include:

(a) monitoring the security threats emerging from the region;

(b) mapping existing aid packages by NATO members and partners to identify gaps;

(c) enhancing training, scholarships, and media literacy efforts to help counter Russian disinformation;

(d) listening and talking to people from the region; and

(e) being patient, to await some future day when more advantageous opportunities materialize.

These ideas are better than nothing, but they are not calculated to counter Russia’s energetic work on the ground to help African military rulers maintain power.

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Jonathan M. Winer, a Non-Resident Scholar at the Middle East Institute, was the US Special Envoy and Special Coordinator for Libya from 2014 to 2016 as well as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Law Enforcement.

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The Middle East Institute (MEI)

The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya

Wolfram Lacher

∎ Prevailing approaches to understanding Islamist mobilisation struggle to explain why militant Islamist movements in Libya initially spread rapidly after 2011 and then disappeared almost overnight. Their decline poses a puzzle for conventional analyses.

∎ Tactical choices, such as the search for protection or allies, fuelled both the rise and fall of militant Islamists. The tactical options that were in fact considered by conflict actors were also determined by social factors, such as relationships of trust they maintained and the social acceptance they enjoyed.

∎ The short-lived flourishing of militant Islamist movements can be understood as a fashion, among other things. Protagonists sought to socially demarcate themselves or to conform by superficially adopting Islamist rhetoric and aesthetics and then discarding them again.

∎ Analysing the dramatic decline of militant Islamist movements helps to understand the full range of motivations fuelling their rise. Social recognition has so far been overlooked as a motivation for armed mobilisation.

∎ The Libyan case shows that labels such as “Islamists” and “jihadists” need to be treated with extreme caution, particularly in the context of ongoing conflicts. External actors should first recognise that conflict parties deliberately misuse such categories, and second they should develop a precise understanding of the social environment in which militant Islamist movements operate.

Issues and Conclusions

Where Have All the Jihadists Gone? The Rise and Mysterious Fall of Militant Islamist Movements in Libya As in other Arab Spring countries, militant Islamist movements flourished in Libya in the first few years following the fall of the regime.

After Muammar al-Gaddafi’s rule ended in 2011, they were popular among many young Libyans and they benefited from an escalation in violent conflicts, which made them allies of other armed groups. But from 2016 onwards, these movements dramatically lost importance and appeal – as occurred in other regional countries at around the same time.

There were obvious reasons for this: first and foremost the military defeats of militant Islamist groups and the demonisation of all Islamists by Libyan and regional media. Nevertheless, the sudden fall of militant Islamists in Libya is puzzling.

It is difficult to reconcile with the two leading explanations for jihadist mobilisation. One school of thought emphasises the role of ideological radicalisation in the spread of militant Islamist groups. It sees this radicalisation as the reason for the tenacity of such groups – a tenacity they apparently lacked in Libya. Moreover, the question arises as to why Islamist ideology suddenly lost its appeal. Another approach stresses that militant Islamists benefit from conflicts and grievances, which help them to gain followers who pursue non-ideological objectives.

In Libya, however, political divisions and armed conflicts persisted after 2016, even while militant Islamists became increasingly irrelevant. When a third civil war erupted in 2019, it was widely expected that this would lead to a renewed mobilisation of jihadist groups.

Nothing of the sort happened.

This study explores the question of how to explain the abrupt change of fortune of militant Islamists in Libya – and what it teaches us about the driving forces behind Islamist mobilisation. The approach chosen here is based on interviews with members and allies of militant Islamist groups, as well as with actors who observed these groups in their immediate social environment. Recurring patterns in these interviews reveal three types of mechanisms at work in the rise and fall of militant Islamist movements in Libya.

First, there are tactical considerations. Actors joined militant Islamists, entered into alliances with them, or distanced themselves from them in order to react to conflict dynamics – for example, to counter an immediate threat. This aspect is widely recognized in prevailing approaches to jihadist mobilisation.

Second, which tactical choices were plausible depended, among other things, on the social embeddedness of actors and on what was socially acceptable. Militant Islamists benefited from a dense network of trust relations with former revolutionaries dating back to their joint struggle in 2011.

As a result, jihadists were able to mobilise openly in the first few years after 2011 and to become allies of their former brothers in arms in 2014. Confrontations between former revolutionaries and the Islamic State (IS) in 2016 shattered their trust in actors across the militant Islamist spectrum; old friendships broke apart. When the third civil war broke out in 2019, a renewed tactical alliance with militant Islamists was no longer an option, not only from a realpolitik perspective, but also because social ties with them had been severed.

Third, however, the rise of militant Islamists from 2011 onwards was also fuelled by the superficial appropriation of Islamist aesthetics and rhetoric by actors who wanted to stand out or conform. The abrupt disappearance of militant Islamist movements was also driven by this interplay of demarcation and imitation. In post-Gaddafi Libya, revolutionary Islamism was not least a fashion, jihadism an ephemeral youth culture.

The pivotal experience of the fight against IS undoubtedly provided an important impetus for the habitus associated with Islamism to go out of fashion, and for other models for gaining social status to take its place.

What requires explanation, however, is the rapidity with which this impulse spread through parts of society that had previously had little fear of contact with militant Islamists. Processes of imitation and the self-reinforcing weight of conformism can help to account for this.

The third mechanism in particular, which analyses militant Islamism in post-Gaddafi Libya as a fashion, sets this research paper apart from many previous studies on Islamist mobilisation. Studies on militant Islamist groups have predominantly focussed on their expansion and much less on their decline. This is understandable, since these groups are primarily perceived as a security problem and attract attention above all when they are involved in escalating conflicts. However, the excessive focus on mobilisation has favoured analytical approaches that cannot adequately explain an evolution such as that which took place in Libya – and the Libyan case is by no means alone.

Broadening the perspective to include the decline of militant Islamist movements produces a different picture of both their rise and their fall. Such an analytical approach also makes it more straightforward to grasp the full diversity of motivations of those who joined militant Islamist groups or made pacts with them. It helps to reveal how categories such as “Islamists” and “jihadists” were often problematic when such labels were politically relevant.

The protagonists of Libya’s power struggles were well aware of the demonising effect of these terms and deliberately used them in an inflationary manner. Foreign observers often adopted this practice because they did not know the designated actors and their social environment from personal experience. This study shows how diverse the motivations and the extent of ideological commitment were among those who were subsumed under the broad term “militant Islamist

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Dr Wolfram Lacher is Senior Associate in the Africa and Middle East Research Division at SWP.

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SWP Research Paper (June 2024) – German Institute for International and Security Affairs

Jonathan M. Winer

With NATO celebrating 75 years since its founding, Alliance members will gather in Washington, DC, on July 9-11, for a historic summit. Two of the key issues on the agenda will be addressing the acute threats emanating from the Black Sea region and adopting a strategic approach toward the Middle East and Africa. The following article is part of MEI’s special series, “Shoring up NATO’s Vulnerable Flanks,” which aims to help shape these twin consequential debates that will occupy the Alliance ahead of the Washington Summit and beyond.

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It may or may not be a coincidence that the Russian government’s rebrand of the Libya-based wing of the mercenary force formerly known as the Wagner Group into the explicitly state-sponsored and state-controlled “Africa Corps” evokes the infamous Nazi German “Afrika Korps.” But in any case, as this Russian military/paramilitary presence continues to infect the Maghreb, the Sahel, and neighboring regions of the African continent, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and its members have at last begun to take notice.

Four and a half years after the first Russian-African summit, chaired by Russian President Vladimir Putin, and following the deepening Russian penetration of the domestic armed forces of Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, Libya, Mali, Niger, and Sudan, NATO is preparing to respond with its own intensified engagement.

The question remains whether this renewed effort will be too little and too late. Can NATO and its members block Moscow’s malign influence and begin to counter the tide of Russian-sponsored dictatorships, coup-leaders, and human rights violators in Africa? Or will Russia’s engagement remain unimpeded, breeding an ever-expanding region of insecurity, instability, and conflict?

Putin’s bold grab for Africa

The Russian engagement in Africa over the past decade or so has been as systematic as it has been cynical. It began in Libya, which remains central to its future success, with Russia agreeing to print and deliver more than 10 billion in Libyan dinars to Libyan warlord Khalifa Hifter, following the creation of a transitional government, brokered by the United Nations, which was intended to lead to the country’s political reunification. Hifter was able to use those billions, plus military support from the Wagner Group, to recruit and pay an army and slowly take over the coastal east, before moving south. Hifter’s effort to take Tripoli, and control of the entire country, was only blocked by determined resistance from fighters from Misrata, Tripoli, and other western Libyan cities, who were backed by Turkish air support and intelligence.

At the same period, Wagner mercenaries were deployed to Sudan to provide support to then-President Omar al-Bashir, in exchange for gold mining rights Russia has since used to help fund its war on Ukraine. From there, the Wagnerites proceeded to repress local dissent against the Sudanese government, before Moscow began providing Russian military support to fighters from both sides in the county’s ongoing civil war.

This month, Sudan’s military leader, Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, is expected to agree to a deal with President Putin, granting Russia a Red Sea naval logistics base in exchange for Moscow giving the Sudanese Armed Forces more weapons and military support to stave off the opposing paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which Russia had previously also helped.

In the CAR, since late 2017, the Wagner Group, and now the Russian government, have been providing weapons and security services in return for gold and diamond rights, building what the United States government describes as “a vast security and business network [that has] advanced Russia’s destabilizing activities at the expense of CAR’s sovereignty.”

On May 30, the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) imposed sanctions against two Wagner-linked entities involved in such abuses. The Russian military presence in Africa accelerated further in 2020-2023, in the wake of military coups in Mali in 2020 and 2021, one in Burkina Faso in 2022, and the latest in Niger in 2023. In each case, a military junta took over, and the French and other Western forces were kicked out of these francophone African countries — and replaced by Russian forces. The specifics should be humbling for the West.

In July 2022, after nine years of trying to stabilize Mali, the French threw in the towel following the military coup, saying they could not work with the junta there even to combat jihadist terrorist groups, kidnappers, and human or drug traffickers. Russia had no such compunctions, and it sent in attack helicopters, radar equipment, and weapons to support the country’s newly installed military government, which continues to refuse to schedule elections.

According to Paris, as part of the campaign to undermine the French in Mali, Russian mercenaries staged a false-flag operation, putting bodies in mass graves for a video purporting to show the French having massacred locals. In Burkina Faso, as of late 2023, Russia has reportedly provided 100 praetorian guards to protect coup leader Captain Ibrahim Traoré in return for, once again, mining concessions. Meanwhile, the Traoré government continues arresting and expelling French diplomats.

In May 2024, the military government of Niger allowed Russian military personnel to physically enter the Nigerien air base hosting American troops before the US withdrew its roughly 1,000 military personnel, who had been carrying out a counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency mission there. Niamey’s “embarrassing” strategic shift has been characterized as a direct response to Washington’s efforts to discourage closer Nigerien ties with Moscow.

The Russian march is also continuing in Chad, another country controlled by a military junta, which, as of the end of April 2024, took in some 130 Russian military trainers after demanding the departure of 75 American trainers, preparing the way for what one commentator has termed a soon-to-be “protectorate.”

Finally, since the first visit of Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov to Benghazi in August 2023, directly coinciding with the death-by-plane-crash of Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, Russia has doubled- and tripled-down on its military build-up in Libya.

Over the past year, Yevkurov has made five trips to see Hifter; and in mid-June 2024, two Russian destroyers visited the Hifter-controlled Tobruk Naval Base. The warships’ visit was billed as a training mission but was likely a continuation of the delivery of artillery to Hifter’s “Libyan National Army,” either for use in a future military action in Libya or for export south to military forces in neighboring countries.

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Jonathan M. Winer, a Non-Resident Scholar at the Middle East Institute, was the US Special Envoy and Special Coordinator for Libya from 2014 to 2016 as well as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Law Enforcement.

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The Middle East Institute (MEI)

The people of Ben Guerdane survived off the Ras Jadir border crossing. It’s closure hurt them, badly. Nothing much is moving in Ben Guardane, Mohammed says. The money-changing kiosks sit silent and the ad hoc markets by the banks of the saltwater inlets that line the route into the Tunisian border town are empty, they used to sell goods imported into Libya and snuck into Tunisia. Nothing is moving, Mohammed repeats.

The nearby Tunisian border crossing with Libya remains closed, as it has been since late March violence on the Libyan side of the border. The official reason for closure is technical renovations. Fighting had broken out between forces loyal to Libya’s Amazigh, who had largely controlled the crossing since the 2011 revolution, and forces from Tripoli’s Ministry of Interior, shuttering the crossing by March 20. It is not unusual, clashes between militias, and even civil war, have become almost normal for most Libyans since the revolution of 2011, and the border area is wild.

Ben Guardane is struggling, Mohammed says. One way or another, almost everyone in the town relies on trade – legitimate and illegitimate – from Libya. On Thursday, officials from Libya and Tunisia are slated to visit the border crossing at Ras Jedir and mark its reopening after a compromise between the warring factions, brokered by the Libyan Ministry of Defence. Many in Ben Guardane hope it will lead to a resumption of trade, but few believe it.

The traders and the smugglers

Ben Guerdane relies on the border. From the days when local tribes escorted trans-Saharan caravans through the territory, to the establishment of the frontier in 1910, legal and illegal trade has been the border town’s lifeblood. Over the intervening years, trade, traders and smugglers became entrenched in the area’s fabric, until recently given free rein by both coloniser and ensuing governments in return for securing the fractious border region, all at no cost to the state.

That changed from about 2014 onwards, as ISIL fighters,  fuelled in no small part by willing recruits from Tunisia, took swaths of Libya, including Sirte, the birthplace of Muammar Gaddafi. In 2016, the group attempted to invade Tunisia, and ISIL fighters stormed Ben Guerdane, only to be repelled by Tunisian security forces who stayed on beyond the fighting, essentially ending much, though not all, of the town’s autonomy.

Security on the Tunisian side is now handled largely by the state while the Libyan side has been managed by forces from the Amazigh tribespeople of the coastal town of Zuwara, whose relationship with the internationally recognised government in Tripoli is, at best, loose. Controlling Ras Jedir would be significant for any of the factions or armed groups competing for power in Libya.

When it was open, Ras Jedir had miles of trucks passing through each day, carrying everything from commercial goods to industrial cargo manufactured in distant markets for Tunisian clients, delivered by ship to Libyan ports as near as Tripoli or as far afield as Misrata to avoid heavy Tunisian import duties, before being trucked through Ras Jedir into Tunisia.

Around them scurried the myriad numbers of flatbed trucks, distinctive for their heightened suspension, taking goods as diverse as mobile phone covers to Hello Kitty rucksacks to markets throughout Tunisia.

Getting in on the action

Placing an actual value on the total goods passing between Libya and Tunisia at Ras Jedir is impossible. However, Libyan Minister of the Interior Imad Trabelsi was probably not exaggerating greatly in March when he labelled Ras Jedir “one of the largest smuggling hubs in the world”, estimating the value of goods passing illegally there at “$100m a week”.

“On a bad day, anywhere up to 300 trucks, 5,000 cars and 10,000 people can cross the border at Ras Jedir. That’s on a bad day. In terms of taxation and bribes, we’re talking about very serious money,” Hamza Meddeb, a research fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Institute who has written extensively on the border, told Al Jazeera. That the Tripoli government would try and wrest control of the valuable crossing was almost inevitable.

However, while it may have been the clashes between the Zuwara fighters and forces loyal to the Ministry of Interior that triggered its latest closure, the reasons for it remaining closed for so long are likely numerous. “It could be almost anything,” Meddeb continued. “It could be due to Abdul Hamid Dbeibah’s [interim Tripoli prime minister, pending long-promised elections] dispute with the Central Bank, which really doesn’t trust him and has left him short of funding.

“It could be the Libyan funds still being held in Tunisian banks since the revolution, which they’re not allowing them to access without proof of where it came from. The reasons could also lie further afield. Both Tripoli and Tunis have international allies that are rivals, such as the UAE and Turkey.

“Literally, it could be anything,” he said.

Lawmakers in Libya’s capital, locked in a battle for legitimacy with the rival eastern parliament in Benghazi, likely feel that controlling a valuable national asset such as Ras Jedir would bolster their ambitions for international credibility.

For the Amazigh, suppressed brutally under Gaddafi, control of the crossing and other assets, such as the oil platform at Mellitah, is, according to analysts, about safeguarding their future and that of their people as it is political influence. After decades of repression, the Amazigh had been among the first Libyans to pick up arms and join the NATO-led coalition against Gadaffi in 2011. Subsequent years have brought them little but further uncertainty.

However, running through it all is a flow of heavily subsidised Libyan fuel and the illicit networks that shepherd it beyond the North African country’s borders. Despite being oil-rich, Libya still imports much of its refined fuel, which is then sold to citizens at a heavily discounted rate.

According to a yearlong investigation by Bloomberg, anywhere up to 40 percent of fuel imported to Libya is resold to other countries, such as Europe (via Malta), Turkey, Sudan, and Tunisia, through Ras Jedir. “Smuggling has become part of the Libyan economy, especially in borderlands,” Jalel Harchaoui of the Royal United Service Institute said. “Irregular losses of fuel over the border aren’t even reported or estimated by National Oil Company’s [NOC].

“The odds are, if you’re at the top of the NOC, people with links to smuggling helped put you there,” he said. “The recent attempt by the Dbeiba government and its Ministry of Interior to seize the border crossing was at best weak and clumsy,” he said. “It’s taken weeks since for officials at the Ministry of Defence to broker a truce between the Amazigh and the Ministry of Interior. Defence officials … just want stability. As for Tunisia, they just want to see their border back and the flow of goods, including smuggled fuel, resume.” For Mohammed, in his early 30s and reliant on the irregular work the border brings, little of this matters. He’s just waiting for his town to return to life.

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James Brooke 

May was Russia’s bloodiest month in its 28-month war against Ukraine: 38,940 soldiers dead or seriously wounded. This mountain of casualties did not stop the Kremlin from sending 2,000 soldiers and thousands of tons of military equipment to the eastern half of Libya, controlled by a warlord in Benghazi.

Benghazi was front of mind in 2012 when Islamic fundamentalists murdered the American ambassador to Libya and three other American officials. As one byproduct, Washington lost its taste for Libya’s cutthroat politics.

Moscow, however, stepped into the vacuum. Now, after years of intense courtship, Russia might be on the verge of winning basing rights for Russian Navy warships in Tobruk. From that point in the central Mediterranean, Russian Kalibr cruise missiles could hit almost any target in Western Europe. Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that Russia could provide long-range weapons to other countries so that they could strike Western targets.

“A Russian Mediterranean base in Libya would threaten Europe and NATO’s southern flank,” the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote in its new report “Russian Outreach Across Africa.” “The Kremlin’s position in Libya also gives it the opportunity to destabilize Europe by weaponizing migrant flows from Africa, which it now has an even greater influence over thanks to its recent expansion along southern points of trans-Saharan migrant routes in the Sahel.”

In Russia’s hybrid war against the West, Moscow uses uncontrolled immigration as a new weapon. Libya has the longest coastline in North Africa — about 1,100 miles. During the 42-year rule of Moammar Gadhafi, Europe had an unwritten deal with Libya’s eccentric ruler: you keep Africa from crossing the Mediterranean, and we overlook your “eccentricities.”

However, since Gaddafi’s overthrow and death in 2011, Libya reverted to the east-west split of the Italian colonial era of a century ago. There is one government in Tripoli, the United Nations-recognized capital. There is another government in Benghazi. With the split, control of the coast is a thing of the past. Last year, the European Union’s border patrol agency reported that 380,000 African migrants attempted to cross into Europe from Libya — the highest number in almost a decade.

Tobruk, a bitterly contested port during World War II, is 175 miles south of Crete, the Greek island. Human smugglers make that boat trip in one night. To the south, Russia’s new allies — Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger — control human smuggling routes out of the heart of Africa.

Over the last two years, Russia and its satellite Belarus have pumped undocumented migrants across their western land borders. The migrants are pawns in attempts by Russia and Belarus to fuel anti-migrant sentiment and in turn boost far-right parties in the European elections.

In Eastern Libya, the local leader, Gen. Khalifa Haftar, reportedly profits from sending boatloads of African migrants north.

“Haftar has explicitly aided migrant smugglers in Libya by granting them security clearances,” the ISW charged last week. “Russia’s partners in the Nigerien junta annulled an EU-backed migration law that aimed to stem migrant flows in December 2023.”

Ensconced in Benghazi, Gen. Haftar personifies the failure of American diplomacy in Libya. An American citizen, he lived for two decades in northern Virginia where he was a CIA asset. Recently, however, he and many of his six sons quietly moved their money out of American bank accounts.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin is reaping the fruits of a Soviet-era investment. In the late 1970s, Haftar, then a rising young officer in the Gaddafi inner circle, completed a three-year degree for foreign officers at the M. V. Frunze Military Academy in Moscow. A Russian-speaker, Gen. Haftar now is the target of Kremlin courtship: a trip to Moscow to meet President Putin last September and five meetings in Benghazi with Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yunus-bek Yevkurov, including one in recent weeks.

The fruits of this blossoming alliance could be seen two weeks ago at a parade in Benghazi marking the 10th anniversary of the defeat of local Islamist forces who might have been involved in the murder of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. According to open-source intelligence analyst Janes, the centerpiece of the parade were rows of Russian-made Volk, or Wolf, armored personnel carriers, painted in desert camouflage. The Volk fleet is the tip of an iceberg of five shipments made since April 1 to Tobruk from Russia’s Eastern Mediterranean port of Tarsus, Syria, according to ISW.

Russia is partly using Tobruk to send equipment south to bolster the countries in the Sahel where Russian troops are replacing French troops: Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. However, many Russian military assets are now spread around Eastern Libya, according to a new report, “Mediterranean Sea Objective for the African Corps.”

“Russian military personnel and equipment have been spotted in at least 10 locations in eastern Libya since the beginning of March,” according to the report, a joint project of independent outlet Verstka and the All Eyes on Wagner project. Wagner, the Russian mercenary group, has largely been replaced by Russian soldiers answering to Russia’s Defense Ministry. Wounded soldiers from Eastern Libya are routinely treated in Russia.

On the financial side, Libya is believed to launder Russian gas for sale to Europe, contravening EU sanctions. Last month, at the Russia-Islamic World Forum in Russia, Libyan officials invited the Russian company Tatneft to build an oil refinery in Benghazi or Tobruk. Last month, on a visit to eastern Libya, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Russia plans to open a consulate in Benghazi.

In previous assaults on the government in Tripoli, Gen. Haftar flooded the country with as much as $1 billion in fake Libyan dinars, printed by the Russian state currency printer Goznak. Now, analysts believe the new funneling of arms into Eastern Libya presages Russian backing for a military assault by Gen. Haftar on the remaining one-third of Libya outside his control.

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James Brooke has been reporting for The New York Times, Bloomberg and Voice of America. He reported from Russia for eight years and from Ukraine for six years.

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