Author - ab_mnbr

Younes Abouyoub

Elections are an important tool in establishing a legitimate government in any given state. Yet, in the absence of a state itself, elections can become part of the problem rather than the solution.

The crisis in Libya continues unabated, with successive interim arrangements, transitional governments, and legislative bodies having lost their legitimacy in the eyes of the Libyan constituency.

The protracted nature of this crisis further threatens the future of Libya and its territorial integrity, with the country likely to sink deeper into economic collapse, political and social turmoil, and increased insecurity.

Cognizant of this imminent threat, the new Special Representative of the United Nations’ Secretary General in Libya, Abdoulaye Bathily, has been working to design a roadmap for convening national elections at the earliest, that are seen as a way to resolve the protracted crisis.

In February, the House of Representatives adopted a legislative document entitled “the 13th Amendment,” that paved the way for elections which was endorsed by the High Council of State shortly after.

The two chambers of government tasked a 6+6 joint committee to deliberate on electoral laws. The novelty this time is that a high-level panel will be established as a mechanism to ensure broader national ownership of the electoral process by Libyans from different walks of life beyond the usual small group of influential legislative actors. This is a welcome development that will ensure more inclusiveness and a wider participation.

Two governments without a state

Despite a number of positive developments, including months of relative security stability, the constitutional and political crisis remains unresolved, state institutions are fractured and polarized, particularly the executive and other sovereign institutions. According to a UN study published in 2020, the estimated cost of the Libyan conflict since its inception in 2011 has reached $576 billion.

Despite efforts exerted by the international community to assist Libya in its political transition, unfortunate policy choices were made in the immediate post-conflict phase in 2011, when a hurried electoral process preceded the stabilization of the country.

This process of stabilization required rebuilding key institutions, the most important of which the implementation of an effective security sector reform plan. Instead, a power-sharing process trumped the institutional capacity development and state-building process.

The state should have come before a government. Today, Libya has two governments, fragmented institutions but no state.

The installation of the interim Government of National Unity (GNU) in March 2021, with a mandate to hold presidential and parliamentary elections on 24 December, 2021, while a major positive development, contributed little to an effective reunification of the fiercely contested institutions between the east and the west de facto powers.

The chronic multi-level fragmentation of governance structures since the state collapse in 2011, particularly key institutions including the Central Bank of Libya and the security sector ones, has been severely taxing for stability in Libya.

This institutional fragility stalled the implementation of the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum Roadmap agreed upon in the Berlin Conference in 2021, as the national elections planned for 24 December, 2021 had to be indefinitely postponed due to schisms and disputes among Libyan political actors and institutions on a plethora of issues, not the least of which, the constitutional basis for elections, and eligibility requirements for presidential candidates.

The political crisis deepened polarization and tensions among political and security actors with shifting alliances among armed groups resulting in periodic armed clashes, mainly in the Tripolitania region, resulting in civilian casualties and destruction of civilian infrastructure.

Overcoming perceptions of the state

as the ‘enemy of the people’

It is true that the current Libyan political impasse is overdetermined and multi-faceted. Some of its ramifications have their roots in the legacy of the 1951 state formation, and most of all the four decades of Gaddafi’s regime, under which the state was considered as the enemy of the people.

In other words, this crisis is symptomatic of Libya’s failure to become a modern and effective state. The apparent failure to resolve the conflict since 2011 and bring about a lasting peace, is rooted in the adoption of a series of approaches, time and again, that rest on power sharing ignoring Libya’s state-building needs.

The post-conflict transition plans lacked strategic foresight and suffered from a deficient understanding of Libya’s historical legacy and political economy. This tragic lacuna would come back to haunt both Libyans and international actors, as its components became major drivers of the protracted conflict.

Without engaging in counterfactual history, more than a decade after the events, some critical assessment is nevertheless due.

Once the Constitutional Declaration was adopted in August 2011, it would have been more appropriate for the National Transitional Council (NTC), with the assistance of the international community, to plan for a longer transition period to allow for effective institutional building and address priority issues, particularly in the security sector, and resolve the thorny issue of the armed groups through an effective disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) process.

Some would argue that elections were a priority, necessary to establish a legitimate government. After all, the NTC was not an elected government. While this is theoretically true, the fact remains that elections, by nature, tend to divide constituencies along ideological and partisan lines.

In a country like Libya, whose citizens had lived under a quasi-totalitarian rule for decades, political life was non-existent since political parties, unions, and other relevant institutions were banned.

Libyans were to a large extent unified around what they did not want, i.e., Gaddafi, but this popular consensus was still too fluid, too fragile to be put to the electoral test. The reality is that 2011 elections broke the revolutionary sacred union of the Libyans.

An inclusive national dialogue should have taken place in the early phase, to broker a large popular agreement on a truly inclusive transitional authorities, which would then be mandated to prepare carefully for fair and transparent elections, easing thus the potential divisions that would surface in the post-electoral phase.

Inclusive national dialogue and

reconciliation process necessary

As SRSG Bathily rightly pointed out, “elections are not just about the constitutional and legal documents (…)There are other critical issues that need to be addressed.”

While the current context differs from that of 2011, and elections today can play a role in restoring a much-needed legitimacy, lessons learned from relatively similar post-conflict situations around the globe prove that state building has become the central objective in responding to fragility and post-conflict needs through conceptualizing and rebuilding the state and its institutions within the broader context of the relationship between state and society.

Therefore creating an inclusive process that moves states from conflict-driven fragility to resilience and legitimate statehood.

Beyond the electoral process, what is needed now is not only to bring more “excluded elite actors” into the political process through yet another power-sharing agreement, but to ensure that the right kind of participation, buy-in and most of all a genuine reconciliation happens between all national stakeholders.

This can be achieved, at the national level, through a Libyan-led inclusive national dialogue and national reconciliation process. At the international level, this Libyan effort can be supported by an inclusive National Libyan-Libyan Peace Conference modality to ensure the initiation of a broader and more inclusive consensus on a vision for building the state and a governance structure with its corollary institutions.

Short of that, Libya will be condemned to a Sisyphean fate – a never-ending cycle of power-sharing agreements, and repetitive elections, leading to more government formations with no state in sight. 

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Younes Abouyoub has long experience in conflict resolution, peace building and governance. He previously advised the UN Under-Secretary General for Conflict Prevention including Burundi. He also advised the UN Secretary General Special Envoy to Yemen and the UN Special Representative for Libya and was a senior regional expert in the UN Security Council Panel of Experts on Sudan (Darfur)

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Youssef M. Sawani

Conclusion

This report shows that for any dialogue to succeed in realizing a sustainable resolution to the Libyan crisis, it must be transformative and adaptive. This goal may be achieved with clearer and solid commitments to end foreign meddling and by designing a broader inclusive national dialogue that puts reconciliation at the forefront.

The interviewees, despite their different political and social orientations, all agree that the LPA process has actually deepened the crisis without being able to resolve anything and has led to extensive delays in the peace process in Libya, with more fault lines and divides occurring, even within each of the original two sides UNSMIL sought to reconcile.

A truly genuine national dialogue is a constructed political process on its own. This implies that dialogue must achieve the meaningful result of moving the country and the society beyond conflict.

This challenge was more acute as the LPA actually originated from the talks between a group of people UNSMIL had hand-picked, even though most of them had no clear legal status – or rather a legal status was bestowed upon them by the institutions they were supposed to represent giving them legitimacy, that was actually nullified as they acted against their mandate – as interviewees indicated.

This was another testimony that the LPA would not produce any sustainable political settlement and why the resultant institutions of the LPA were unable to gain consensus or legitimacy to serve as constituting bodies.

For any dialogue to succeed in realizing a sustainable resolution to the Libyan crisis, it must be transformative and adaptive. This goal may be achieved with clearer and solid commitments to end foreign meddling and by designing a broader inclusive national dialogue that puts reconciliation at the forefront.

The LPA was not able to generate legitimacy either in the process or its outcomes. Talks were not open to the public and this undermined the LPA’s ability to be a tool for making conflict resolution possible, at the grassroots or societal level, by shifting the existing polarised conflict.

Consequently, the same dividing narratives that dominated the Libyan conflict, such as Islamists vs non-Islamists, revolution vs counter revolution, Azlam vs revolutionaries, and many others, are still prevalent.

The LPA and its results have been exploited in these contending narratives and have been exploited in political propaganda.

As the increase in hate speech and the propaganda war in the Libyan media, especially social media, indicates, the LPA created a context in which Libyans are even more divided than before while new issues of contestation have been added.

The process failed to evolve into a transformative national dialogue that includes a change in public attitudes and the creation of an environment where there is an openness to ideas that make change possible and cause it to be sought after.

The public must be willing to accept these new ideas and play a decisive role in helping them transform into a sustainable reality. This is not the case, however, and the conflict in Libya is becoming more entrenched. The LPA was not able to generate legitimacy either in the process or its outcomes.

Talks were not open to the public and this undermined the LPA’s ability to be a tool for making conflict resolution possible, at the grassroots or societal level, by shifting the existing polarised conflict.

Despite the recent jubilation regarding the formation of a new PC and GNU that resulted in the conclusion of the LPDF talks, disagreements are still standing in the way, and, as interviewees indicate, the UNSMIL process faces serious challenges and consensus is difficult to realise.

The adoption by the LPDF of a majoritarian formula for voting on proposals has also proven problematic. While hopes of achieving tangible success are mounting, many obstacles remain in the way of consensus. Issues like the appointment to senior state roles, e.g. that of the Central Bank of Libya’s (CBL) governor, the constitutional rules, federalism and the rights of regions, and the distribution of resources are the subjects about which agreement is difficult to reach.

Moreover, foreign interventions, reconciliation, and the unification of the military forces remain the toughest obstacles.

On the ground, armed militias continue to dominate and control capabilities and resources, with a major part of them opposing any dialogue and threatening war again.

While the interviews confirm what analysts have been positing – that is that the Libyan powerbrokers have been the main obstructers of the peace process, and the realising of its objectives – they also identify foreign interference to have negatively affected the UN and other mediation activities.

As a matter of fact, some interviewees completely attribute the Libyan crisis to foreign interests and interventions that have, ever since 2011, prevented peace and reconciliation.

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Youssef M Sawani – Academic with long teaching and research experience. Independent Researcher. , Faculty Member with University Of Tripoli.

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Maureen Farrell

The Trump administration’s appointment in April of Massad Boulos as its senior advisor for Africa was initially met with some skepticism in Washington. Boulos had little previous diplomatic experience, his role seemed ill-defined, and a driving factor in his appointment appeared to be that he is Tiffany Trump’s father-in-law.

Since then, however, Boulos has successfully leveraged his family ties to US President Donald Trump and his previous experience navigating African politics to spearhead negotiations for the “Washington Agreement” between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on June 27.

Then in July, Boulos concluded a series of meetings in North Africa, which could open the door to another diplomatic breakthrough, this time in Libya, if the administration follows through.

Libya today

Libya has entered a period of fragile calm. The Government of National Unity (GNU), based in Tripoli, and the Libyan National Army (LNA), which controls the east of the country, have stabilized their respective territories, even as the two rival power centers vie for authority.

Deep problems persist. Political fragmentation and weak or absent state structures are creating the conditions for institutional paralysis.

Russia and other countries continue to exercise dangerous influence. Desperation continues to send would-be refugees on the perilous trek north across the Mediterranean. But as the cease-fire brokered in 2020 between the GNU and LNA is continuing to hold, now is the moment for the United States to put diplomacy to work.

Recent US efforts 

US policy in Libya has evolved significantly from the shocking death of US Ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi in 2012. The Biden administration, for example, made a concerted effort to engage more with Libya. In March 2023, it released a ten-year plan for preventing conflict and promoting stability in Libya under the Global Fragility Act. Then in March 2024, it notified Congress of a plan to reopen the US embassy in Tripoli.

In its first seven months in office, Trump administration has built on this earlier work. In April, it conducted a ship visit to Libya with the USS Mount Whitney, the first by a US Navy vessel in more than fifty years. In July, it dispatched Boulos to both Tripoli and Benghazi, as well as to neighboring countries Tunisia, Algeria, and Egypt—presumably to look for avenues to advance peace and stability, which would pave the way for Libya’s energy resources to reach global markets.

All in the family

While skeptics criticized Boulos’s family connections or business background, he has used both to deliver a decisive advantage in diplomatic negotiations. Counterparts in the region—many of whom are not new to the influence of familial envoys—know that trusted ties mean access, and access means authority. Boulos has the latitude to promise and deliver creative solutions.

More than ever, Libya needs that authority and creativity. Boulos is well positioned to advance regional and global objectives regarding stability for Libya’s oil exports and broader economic development, countering global terrorist networks, and managing strategic competition with Russia.

Boulos has proven through his work with the DRC and Rwanda that he can leverage White House access to bring US national and global attention to complex problems. The sustainment of that effort and future progress for Libya hinges on the work of the career bureaucracy and uniformed military services to engage diplomatically and message consistently and cohesively.

It also depends on their ability to build and maintain reliable security partnerships and deliver on economic promises for US private-sector investments. Such officials maintain long-standing relationships, regional knowledge, and functional expertise that the administration can use to its advantage, and they deserve the administration’s trust to carry forth such an agenda.

Four steps forward

Combining the advantages of Boulos and career US diplomats and military officers, there are four near-term actions the Trump administration can take to bolster its ties to Libya.

First, the administration should nominate an ambassador to Libya, and the Senate should swiftly confirm this selection to replace Richard Norland, who departed the post in 2022.

Chargés d’affaires perform an incredible service and achieve remarkable things for US interests, but they cannot possibly achieve the same results or gain the same access as a Senate-confirmed personal representative of the US president.

Rather than continuing operations from Tunis, the next US ambassador to Libya should reopen the US embassy in Tripoli and maintain full-time operations in-country. The future ambassador’s presence would demonstrate a commitment to maturing the US-Libya bilateral relationship.

Until then, the US government should maintain or accelerate the pace of in-country engagements, extending each of these in duration until the US official diplomatic presence is persistent, if not permanent.

Second, the administration should roll out a concerted public information campaign articulating its policy objectives for Libya. This information campaign should outline marching orders for US departments and agencies working on Libya. It should assure Libyan stakeholders of the US interest in improving US-Libya ties. And it should reinforce to global actors—both friend and foe—that the United States is invested in Libya’s stability and economic markets.

The Trump team has demonstrated finesse in managing information flows to the US and global media. For example, their information campaigns to US and global audiences on migration are nothing if not clear.

A well-choreographed public affairs campaign articulating that the United States supports peace efforts in Libya and that the country is open for business will help reinforce other elements of US power operating in Libya in both the public and private sector. Such messages will also bolster confidence among Libyans that they can take steps toward the United States and policies that advantage the United States, while prompting allies and partners to consider aligning with US positions on Libya.

Third, the Department of Defense and Department of State should continue to incrementally increase US engagement and cooperation with defense forces and law enforcement in both GNU- and LNA-held territories. US forces have much to learn from engagements with their Libyan counterparts. Libyan forces have, for instance, tracked and countered terrorists in austere environments for decades with no reliable resourcing, and they have balanced the interests of strategic competitors waging influence campaigns within their borders.

Several US defense, law enforcement, and intelligence arms have strategic, operational, and tactical interests in collaborating with their Libyan counterparts to disrupt global terrorist operations and impede Russia’s efforts to destabilize the Sahel and Central Africa. The administration should resource such security investments.

This does mean spending US taxpayer dollars overseas. But providing security cooperation and assistance to Libyan forces can pay dividends in countering terrorism, thwarting Russia’s bids for influence on the continent, and advancing regional stability for economic markets.

Fourth, the Trump administration, with Boulos as its point person, should use its connections in the US private sector, particularly in the oil and gas industry, to broker relationships with Libya’s business community. Libya’s oil wealth is unparalleled on the African continent, but the country’s conflicts have shuttered production and export facilities.

Historically, Libya has been a wealthy and influential country, boasting elite security forces and influence throughout Africa and the Mediterranean, and there is extraordinary economic potential in the country that can help return it to that role in the medium and long term.

Moreover, the White House could leverage the Voluntary Principles Initiative to usher in respect for human and labor rights in Libya, thereby mitigating risk, creating value for Libyans, and advantaging the approaches of US companies. The Trump administration speaks the language of the private sector and brings enormous influence in this space that can catalyze deals, creating new economic opportunities. 

Trump and his team have admirably dedicated diplomatic weight to political and economic dealmaking in several global arenas. North Africa is hopefully its next target. Boulos’s family connection to Trump provides a tangible platform for brokering talks that can lead to greater stability and open economic pathways in Libya.

The Trump administration should continue to support his personal engagement in Libya in pursuit of key US national interests in bolstering security and increasing economic prosperity.

At the same time, career diplomats and members of the US military, in support of the president’s policies, must be empowered and resourced to follow through with traditional tools of US national power to reinforce and execute prospective agreements.

Absent such efforts to sustain diplomatic progress, the results of the administration’s peacemaking and dealmaking efforts will dissipate by the next news cycle. 

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Maureen Farrell is a nonresident senior fellow in the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security and vice president for global partnerships at Valar, a Nairobi-based strategic advisory and risk firm. She previously served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for African affairs and director for African affairs at the US National Security Council. 

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Youssef M. Sawani

Executive Summary

It is a long and winding road towards peace and stability in Libya. Despite some relative positive developments following the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum (LPDF), a durable peace still eludes the Libyan people and the international community.

Today, Libya is faced with an uncertain future: a political morass; severe economic hardship; risks of renewed military escalation due to the political deadlock following the expiration of the LPDF roadmap; and a failed electoral process.

Enduring violence in Libya, though at a low intensity, as demonstrated by regular militia skirmishes, coupled with the continued presence of foreign fighters and mercenaries, makes peace fragile and vulnerable to further upheavals.

Substantial work on the political, economic, and military tracks remains pending, including the resolution of complex issues such as the future of militias, security, and the thorny issues of the electoral process and a permanent constitution.

Despite the efforts exerted by the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) to move the constitutional process forward during the latest high-level meeting on Libya’s constitutional track in Geneva on June 28-29, 2022, major disagreements persist on a number of issues, mainly on the eligibility requirements for the candidates in the first presidential elections post-2011.

While the several rounds of consultations in Cairo and Geneva yielded significant progress, they have fallen short in meeting requirements to hold comprehensive and inclusive national elections in Libya. The fact is that since the fall of the Gaddafi regime,

Libya has failed to transition to stability and democracy, as both the uprising and the ensuing conflict divided Libyans into essential categories of ‘winners’ and ‘losers.’

The UN and a number of international actors have attempted to bring resolution to the crisis through various mediation efforts but the role of foreign powers, including some of the permanent member states of the UN Security Council (UNSC), has not always been constructive.

Disagreement and 4 competing interests between these UNSC member states have negatively impacted the trajectory of the conflict, impeding the efforts of the UN to find a durable settlement to the conflict.

Competing foreign interests have often prevented consensus both at national and international levels. Despite some positive results in the political process, the crisis continues unabated. However, no final, inclusive, and lasting settlement looms on the horizon, in part because little serious attention has been paid to keys issues such as national dialogue, transitional justice, security sector reform, and reconciliation.

The UN has been involved in mediation in the Libyan conflict through its special mission in Libya, UNSMIL. However, each head of the mission – Special Representatives of the Secretary General (SRSGs) – Ian Martin, Tarek Mitri. Bernardino León, Martin Kobler, Ghassan Salamé, Acting SRSG Stephanie Williams, and Ján Kubiš – opted for different approaches.

A comparison of these efforts suggests that there have been inherent flaws in the design of the process and inconsistencies of strategy and approach.

In addition to the lack of a unified strategy in the UN led political process, there have also been concerns within large segments of Libyan society that the impartiality and neutrality of the UN has been compromised at times, and the political process has lacked transparency, according to our interviewees.

Participants were kept in the dark ahead of the political dialogue and had no access to the dialogue agenda, its minutes, or the results. Coupled with the negative influence of contending regional and international actors, the UN process was destined to fail in many respects.

This report demonstrates that in the eyes of the majority of Libyans the work of UNSMIL suffered many weaknesses and scored quite low on most criteria considered necessary for success.

As there was no clear transparent criteria for selecting the participants in the national dialogue processes, the consequent deficiencies of inclusion and ownership 5 reduced accountability and allowed participants to politicize the process.

Moreover, there were few voices representing civil society and their limited participation was seen more as a token attempt at inclusivity. Women’s participation did not constitute any meaningful representation. Thus, the process failed to address the issues related to women and civil society further reduced inclusivity, undermined public ownership, and ignored the conditions that continue to generate conflict and violence.

Lack of inclusivity and ownership also meant that implementation became essentially haphazard and circumstantial. The Libyan Political Agreement (LPA), being the major achievement of UNSMIL and the framework that defines its work and determines current Libyan state institutions, has, despite all the support it had from UNSMIL and the international community, failed to achieve its objectives.

In fact, the LPA created a context in which Libyans became even more divided than before and created new issues of contestation. The process failed to become a transformative national dialogue inducing changes in public attitudes that would pave the way for desired and sustainable change, and thus the conflict has become more entrenched.

This report shows that for any dialogue to achieve a sustainable resolution to the Libyan crisis, it must be transformative and adaptive. This goal may be achieved with clearer and more solid commitments to ending foreign interference, and the designing of a broader, more inclusive national dialogue that puts reconciliation at the very forefront.

Any attempt to resolve the Libyan conflict must be based on an appropriate understanding of the socio-economic, and historical contexts, that will help parties genuinely commit to implementation of agreements.

Any effort that ignores this requirement will result in a superficial agreement that could backfire. There is a need to widen participation, uphold Libyan ownership, and limit foreign interference.

Instead of continuing to rely on foreign actors, peace in Libya will require Libyan stakeholders joining together to develop a peace and reconciliation agreement through a Libyan-led process, in which they themselves frame the contested issues as shared problems.

This would pave the way for the implementation of commitments and guarantees based on mutual, not exclusive, benefits. Such an agreement would then no longer be a mere tool for power-sharing that privileges some factions.

Instead of continuing to rely on foreign actors, peace in Libya will require Libyan stakeholders joining together to develop a peace and reconciliation agreement through a Libyan-led process, in which they themselves frame the contested issues as shared problems.

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Youssef M Sawani – Academic with long teaching and research experience. Independent Researcher. Faculty Member with University Of Tripoli.

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The MED This Week newsletter provides informed insights on the most significant developments in the MENA region, bringing together unique opinions and reliable foresight on future scenarios. Today, we shed light on the Libya’s persistent fragility and the efforts to overcome it.  

Stability in Libya still seems far on the horizon. The country remains divided between two centres of power– the West, governed by the Government of National Unity (GNU), and the East, controlled by Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) – with fragile institutions constantly on the brink of violence. Rising tensions in Tripoli are once again fueling fears that renewed military escalation could spread through the city.

Pro-GNU forces are seeking to consolidate control at the expense of rival armed groups, particularly the Special Deterrence Force (Al-Rada), with which there had already been clashes in May 2025.

Against this backdrop, three years after the last meeting between Khalifa Haftar and Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, on 3 September 2025, Saddam Haftar, son of Haftar and recently appointed as Deputy General Commander of the LNA, met in Rome with Ibrahim Dbeibah, nephew of Dbeibah.

Although details of the meeting are still unclear, questions are mounting about its purpose and its implications for Libya’s future. The presence of US Envoy for Africa Massad Boulos also signaled renewed interest by the Trump Administration in the Libyan dossier.

Yet, another player is stepping up: Turkey. Long considered a “historic” ally of Western Libya, Ankara has increasingly reached out to the Eastern camp, raising the prospect of becoming an even more prominent force in shaping the country’s trajectory.

Meanwhile, back in August, UN Special Representative for Libya Hanna Tetteh presented a new roadmap for Libya, built around three central goals: forming a unified national government for both Libyas, establishing a credible electoral system, and launching an inclusive dialogue.

However, critics warn that the roadmap falls short of addressing the systemic flaws at the heart of Libya’s crisis, and risks reproducing the same patterns that derailed previous initiatives.  

Experts from the ISPI network discuss Libya’s persistent fragility. 

Rome hosted the two Libyas, but remains

on the backdrop  

“In a context marked by a looming deterioration of the security situation in Tripoli, discreet talks between Ibrahim Dbeibah and Saddam Haftar, as well as shifting stances of influential foreign actors involved in Libya, Rome hopes that there is still room to avoid another escalation in its southern neighbour.

Italy fears repercussions of instability in terms of a further rise in the number of people crossing the Mediterranean and of new threats to its energy supply – basically the two main drivers of its approach to Libya over the past years. However, as the Dbeibah-Haftar talks demonstrate, of which Rome was only the venue as negotiations were led by the United States, this approach has shown its limits.

Prioritising migration management over consistent efforts to stabilise Libya and playing an ambiguous role by engaging with both western and eastern Libyan authorities, Rome has seen its influence over the crisis progressively declining and has slid to the backdrop of discussion on the future of the country.” 

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Aldo Liga, Research Fellow, ISPI MENA Centre  

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Dbeibah’s zero-sum security:

consolidation at the cost of stability 

“The deterioration of Tripoli’s security establishment reflects both long-term neglect and acute political pressures. Following the UN Special Representative Hanna Tetteh’s political roadmap announcement, the regional procession of diplomats to Haftar reinforced Dbeibah’s sense of existential threat, strengthening his rationale for consolidating control and portraying himself as an inevitable political fixture, much as Haftar did in the East.

Yet the GNU has never prioritised substantive security sector reform. Instead, it has entrenched a system of transactional deals with armed group leaders, privileging short-term loyalty and coercive leverage over institutional reform.

This dynamic is what heightened the risk for confrontation: one of the only remaining anti-GNU Tripoli-based groups – the socially entrenched Special Deterrence Force – has invested in entrenchment and alliance-building designed to raise the costs of Dbeibah’s consolidation, betting that withstanding Dbeibah’s pressures will ultimately yield leadership change.

In this climate, both camps interpret compromise as existentially threatening, turning security arrangements into zero-sum instruments of survival rather than pathways to stabilisation.” 

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Emaddeddin Badi, Expert, Centre on Armed Groups; Senior Fellow, Global Initiative

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Against Transnational Organized Crime 

The new roadmap for Libya: Tetteh’s bid to break the Libyan deadlock 

“The last roadmap is derivative of its predecessors’ efforts, and is similarly influenced by intervening nations in Libya despite their designs running contrary to what is best for Libyans and most stabilising for Libya.

This roadmap is distinguished by the move towards a new unifying government before elections, which could be a dangerous flashpoint. All Libyan institutions and politicians are broadly considered illegitimate.

So, there are valid fears that without changing the system, any new combination of these politicians will act as all their predecessors did in the same environment: derail the transition, entrench, and facilitate private interests in place of public good.

Ultimately, the roadmap’s success is dependent on the good faith engagement of international actors and their willingness to use coercive tools like sanctions on spoilers. Something Tetteh’s predecessors all lacked and suffered for.

A fatal flaw Tetteh is trying to redress, by resurrecting the Berlin process.” 

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Tarek Megerisi, Senior Policy Fellow, ECFR 

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Trump’s new approach to Libya:

business first 

“The first Trump Administration’s dealings with Libya were simply disastrous. In fact, following more than 2 years of almost complete neglect, there came five minutes of a phone call with General Haftar in which Trump endorsed the general’s brutal military attack against the city of Tripoli ‘as long as he did it quickly’.

No further words of comment are needed.

The second Trump Administration is a bit different only because more people belonging to the President’s entourage have been, one way or the other, interested, albeit only in the economic and business potential of the North African country.

The main word characterising most relationships between the Trump government and the various states has been ‘Transactional’, clearly framing every relationship within an economic and trade framework, not a political or social one.

The appointment of Massad Boulos, the father-in-law of Trump’s daughter Tiffany, as US envoy to Africa tells exactly this story, one of disinterest for every aspect of foreign policy planning and analysis in favour of basic business deals.” 

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Karim Mezran, Director, Resident Senior Fellow, North Africa Initiative, Atlantic Council; Senior Associate Research Fellow, ISPI 

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Betting on both sides: Ankara’s

repositioning in Eastern Libya   

“Few foreign policy pivots are as bold, or as fraught with risk, as betting on both sides of a civil conflict. Yet that is precisely what Turkey appears to be doing in Libya.

Having established military and political influence in western Libya, most notably through its decisive military intervention in support of the UN-backed GNU against Khalifa Haftar’s LNA in 2019-2020, Ankara is now extending olive branches to the East – to the very actors it once sought to marginalise.

The pace of this shift is striking. Turkey is reportedly preparing to expand security cooperation, including providing military training and arms sales, with the LNA, commanded by Haftar.

The Tobruk-based House of Representatives has formed a commission to review – and potentially ratify – the 2019 maritime and security agreements. In August, a Turkish naval vessel docked in Benghazi, followed by high-level talks between Intelligence Chief İbrahim Kalın and eastern Libya’s military leader Khalifa Haftar in Benghazi.

Taken together, these developments signal how rapidly Ankara is repositioning itself on Libya’s eastern front, seeking new security footholds to complement its growing economic presence in the last couple of years.” 

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Nebahat Tanrıverdi Yaşar, visiting Fellow, SWP

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Yassin K. Fawaz

The paradox of post-Gadhafi Libya is not that it was captured by one foreign patron, but that it was abandoned too many.

Muammar Gadhafi was toppled in 2011 with Western bombs and Libyan blood. What came after was not liberation, but vacuum. America, having helped oust the dictator, promptly lost interest. Europe fumbled. The United Nations produced roadmaps that nobody obeyed. Into the void poured every power with an agenda, Russia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Italy, France and others. Yet more than a decade on, Libya belongs to none of them. It is a country run by nobody, for nobody, except its warlords.

The paradox of post-Gadhafi Libya is not that it was captured by one foreign patron, but that it was abandoned too many. Each has meddled; none has stabilised. Libya has become an orphan of geopolitics, too important for outsiders to ignore yet never important enough for any to take responsibility. Its oil reserves make it a prize, its location on Europe’s doorstep a temptation. But its politics remain a stalemate, sustained by foreign indulgence and domestic greed.

This was not inevitable. When Gadhafi fell, Libya still had the rough outline of a state: ministries, a central bank, an oil company with global partners. What it lacked was the security and diplomatic scaffolding and political culture to make those institutions work together. Only America had the weight to provide that scaffolding. Instead it stepped back, leaving Europeans divided in their pursuit of Libya’s spoils and regional players emboldened. The result was a free-for-all in which militias flourished, revenues were carved up, and the idea of a national project slowly withered.

Today Libya is not a failed state so much as a stalled one: neither collapsing nor recovering, neither captured nor free. It is a monument not to American overreach but to American absence.

The revolution that never was

The uprising of 2011 began with chants in Benghazi and Misrata, inspired by the Arab Spring. It ended with a French-led NATO air power smashing Gadhafi’s convoys, rebels storming Tripoli and the colonel dragged from a culvert and killed. Western leaders congratulated themselves. Libyan insurgents celebrated.

But the “day after” never came. Barack Obama had no appetite for a stabilisation mission. Britain and France, loudest in calling for intervention, offered little beyond rhetoric. Italy, with oil interests at stake, pressed for contracts rather than governance. The UN dutifully drafted blueprints for elections and national councils. None materialised.

The violence soon reached America directly. In September 2012 Ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed in Benghazi, when Islamic militants stormed the US mission. His death was more than a tragedy; it was the predictable outcome of Barack Obama’s weak foreign policy of “leading from behind.”

Washington had intervened to help topple Gadhafi, but shrank from the burdens of stabilisation. A lightly protected diplomatic mission was left exposed in a city overrun by militias. You cannot topple a regime halfway. If America intervenes without stabilising, the vacuum becomes deadlier than the dictatorship. The lesson was stark: either you go all in, or you do not go in at all.

By 2012 militias ruled the streets. The national army was a fiction. Assassinations multiplied. Embassies packed up. In 2014 rival parliaments emerged in Tripoli and Tobruk, each with its own backers, each claiming legitimacy. Libya slid into civil war. America chose the halfway house, and Libya has lived with the consequences ever since. That retreat looks stranger when set against America’s past pragmatism.

Under George W Bush, Washington was prepared to do business even with Gadhafi himself. In 2003 the Libyan long-time ruler renounced weapons of mass destruction. Within a few years Condoleezza Rice was visiting Tripoli and American oil firms were rushing back. If Libya was valuable enough to rehabilitate a tyrant, why was it deemed expendable once that tyrant was gone?

The answer lies less in Libya than in Washington. Iraq had soured Americans on “nation-building.” Barack Obama wanted out of the Middle East. Libya was seen as Europe’s problem, not America’s. Yet leaving such a strategic prize, Africa’s largest oil reserves, a gateway to the Sahel, a launch pad on the Mediterranean, to squabbling warlords and meddling middle powers was a choice. And it is one that haunts Libya still.

The free-for-all

The absence of the United States created a vacuum into which every mid-level power inserted itself. The UAE armed and funded Khalifa Haftar, the strongman of the east, with drones, cash and political support. Turkey backed Tripoli, sending advisers, drones, and later Syrian mercenaries. Russia deployed Wagner fighters, carving out bases in the east and south.

Egypt, sharing a porous border, meddled to contain Islamists and migrants and safeguard its economic interests. Italy fretted about migration and ENI’s energy contracts. France covertly supported Haftar while professing neutrality. Its political class will be haunted for years by Gadhafi’s illegal financing of Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidential campaign.

Each patron acted tactically. None wanted the cost of reconstruction. None had the reach to impose order. They were strong enough to spoil but not to settle. Libya became a chessboard where every piece was pinned, unable to move but impossible to remove.

Oil, which might have united the state, became the prize that kept it divided. Libya holds Africa’s largest proven reserves. Its National Oil Corporation (NOC) still commands respect abroad, selling crude to international buyers. But revenues flow into the Central Bank in Tripoli, where they are diverted into patronage. Haftar periodically blockades fields to extract concessions.

Every foreign sponsor eyes hydrocarbons. Italy leans on ENI to secure gas for Europe. France’s TotalEnergies seeks its slice. Turkey and the UAE insert themselves into contracts. Russia eyes concessions in the south. Instead of building legitimacy, oil entrenches dysfunction. Every new project abroad becomes another rent for warlords at home.

Why America mattered

No other power had the legitimacy or tools to stabilise Libya. America was NATO’s spearhead in 2011; its word carried weight with Libyans and Europeans alike. It alone had the diplomatic clout to corral allies, the financial leverage to police oil revenues and the deterrent power to restrain spoilers.

Its disengagement mattered in three ways. Diplomacy without weight: UN envoys produced roadmaps, but every faction had a foreign patron to veto progress. Without American backing, no plan stuck. Security without umbrella: militias flourished, each tied to an external sponsor. Only the US could have imposed a security framework. Economy without order: oil revenues became spoils. America could have enforced transparency. Its absence left the treasury open to looting.

For Libyans the lesson was clear: outsiders might intervene briefly, but they would not stay. The rational strategy was not compromise but waiting, bargaining and pocketing rents.

A decade on, Libya is frozen. In the west, Abdulhamid Dbeibah’s Government of National Unity presides over ministries and the central bank but relies on militias to control Tripoli’s streets. In the east, Haftar’s Libyan National Army rules by repression and clientism. His son Saddam now plays envoy abroad, groomed as heir. Both sides sometimes fight, more often collude. They divide oil revenues, share contracts and keep their foreign patrons happy.

Ordinary Libyans endure blackouts, fuel shortages, inflation and unemployment. Services barely function. A generation has grown up with no memory of a working state. Municipal councils occasionally deliver modest improvements, but national elites suffocate them, fearing competition for patronage.

Foreign limits

Foreign patrons remain. Turkey anchors Tripoli, the UAE bankrolls Haftar, Russia lurks with Wagner. Egypt interferes. Italy and France compete through energy firms. Yet all face limits. None can impose unity. None wants the bill for reconstruction. They meddle to block rivals, not to build stability.

Europe’s gamble is energy. ENI has poured billions into gas fields and pipelines. Rome hopes Libyan gas will replace Russian supplies. Yet hydrocarbons do not heal; they divide. Each new contract entrenches the carve-up. Europeans may secure molecules, but not governance.

Russia uses Libya as leverage in its wider confrontation with the West. Turkey treats it as a bargaining chip in the eastern Mediterranean. The UAE uses it to project influence. For all of them Libya is not an end but a means. That is why, despite years of meddling, the country belongs to none of them.

Ironically, even after years of disengagement, America retains the most leverage. Both Tripoli and Benghazi court its approval. Dbeibah craves recognition to shore up his legitimacy. Haftar seeks American attention to offset his dependence on Russia and the Gulf. International oil companies look to Washington as guarantor.

No deal is truly bankable without America’s nod. That makes Washington the one power both sides cannot alienate. The tragedy is that it has been unwilling to use this leverage to push for real renewal. Instead, it has confined itself to modest aims: keep oil flowing, prevent partition, discourage Russian expansion.

US re-engagement?

Change may finally be coming. The Libya file is now being handled by Massad Boulos, a senior adviser close to the White House. I know him well and have a great level of respect for him, his son is like a brother to me. My own presence in President Trump‘s world goes back further: before and after Mr Trump’s first victory in 2016. Taken together, it means that if anyone understands how to reach Donald Trump, it is those of us who have been in his orbit from the very start. And I know Massad is capable. Yet confidence alone is not enough.

The only way anything will shift is if Washington puts its leverage into play. America has tools no one else can match: sanctions that bite, financial levers that starve factions of cash, and, if necessary, military pressure. Both camps in Libya understand this, as do the outsiders who have profited from the vacuum. Under Donald Trump, American policy is not likely to be dressed up in lofty ideals. It will be tough, unapologetic and focused on results. If that toughness is brought to bear, Libya may at last move up the ladder of Washington’s priorities after more than a decade in the wilderness.

Libya is often cited as an example of Western overreach. It is better understood as an example of American absence. The US helped topple a dictator but refused to take responsibility for the aftermath. Rivals were not strong enough to replace it. They only exploited the vacuum.

The consequences extend beyond Libya. The lesson to would-be rebels across the Arab world was clear: America might back uprisings tactically, but it would not stick around to build states. To allies in Europe the message was equally stark: without American leadership, even NATO’s victories turn hollow.

Libya could have been different. With its small population, vast resources and proximity to Europe, it might have been a success story of the Arab Spring. Instead it became an orphan of geopolitics, abandoned by the powers that toppled its tyrant and picked over by lesser predators.

Meetings in Rome, Berlin or Tunis are hailed as breakthroughs. They are theatre. Oil contracts signed in Tripoli or Benghazi are touted as progress. They are spoils. For Libyans, the reality is stasis: a country that belongs to nobody because the only power that might have anchored it chose not to.

Libya is a monument not to imperial hubris but to abdication. It is what happens when America withdraws: not a prize for others, but a void for all. A decade on, the country is still waiting to be claimed, above all by its own citizens.

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Yassin K Fawaz is an American business executive, publisher and security and terrorism expert.

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UN officials are trying to prevent tensions between government and militia forces in western Libya from burgeoning into armed clashes that threaten civilians in and around Tripoli.

Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh, head of the UN-backed government in Tripoli, is intent on dismantling the militias in order to consolidate his authority in the west.

Fighting in western Libya will further complicate the already floundering years-long UN effort to unify rival governments in eastern and western Libya and hold national elections.

Through its troop deployments, Türkiye is messaging Dbeibeh not to attack militia-held installations, but Ankara is also working with the rival government in eastern Libya to secure its interests in the eastern Mediterranean.

As September began, Libya’s fractured post-Qadhafi political architecture stood at the precipice of renewed armed conflict as the UN-backed, Tripoli-based administration (Government of National Unity, GNU) of Prime Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh sought to exert a monopoly of armed force in western Libya. 

Past post-Qadhafi armed conflicts in the country have pitted the Tripoli administration against a competing power center based in eastern Libya, dominated by strongman General Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA).

Since Haftar’s failed 2019 offensive to conquer Tripoli and unify the country, a succession of United Nations mediators has sought, without success, to broker an agreement to combine the rival administrations into a central interim government that would hold elections for a national parliament and presidency. However, political leaders in western and eastern Libya have repeatedly thwarted the UN efforts, in large part because a unification of Libya’s governing structure would inevitably require some leaders to relinquish their authority.

The current threats of violence appear confined mainly to western Libya, where a variety of leaders and factions are competing for power in Tripoli. Dbeibeh calculates that marginalizing armed challengers to his administration will garner him additional support from outside powers and potentially position him to emerge as the leader of a united Libya.

Consolidating his control over all armed forces in western Libya might also enhance Tripoli’s ability to ward off another offensive from Haftar’s LNA, which is benefiting from a Russian redeployment of its military assets in Syria — where Russia seems to be no longer welcome. Dbeibeh and his allies suspect that the militias around Tripoli might potentially assist a future attempt by Haftar to oust Dbeibeh and unify the country by force. However, should Dbeibeh prevail over his western Libya rivals, his leverage to resist any UN-led settlement that requires him to yield office will also increase, further complicating UN efforts to unify Libya’s political structure.

The current unrest appears to represent a revival of tensions that led to deadly armed clashes in and around Tripoli in May, in which several civilians were killed in the crossfire. As was the case in May, the tensions centered on Dbeibeh’s intent to disband the militias forcibly. The proximate conflict, which has sparked competing military maneuvers and at least one clash last week, centers on Dbeibeh’s insistence that a key militia, the Special Deterrence Force (synonymous with the “Radaa Group”), yield to state authorities’ control of sensitive facilities in Tripoli, including Mitiga prison and airport.

The prison is said to hold, among other inmates, members of al-Qaeda and ISIS. Tensions have escalated in recent days as Dbeibeh ordered loyalist forces from Misurata, east of the capital, and from Gharyan to the south, to advance on Mitiga. Reflecting a broader power struggle, the Special Deterrence Force/Radaa Group is aligned with another Tripoli leadership body, the Presidential Council, which was established under a 2015 political agreement to serve as Libya’s head of state and command its armed forces.

In practice, the Council has acquired little authority, and it is seeking to elevate its influence relative to Dbeibeh’s administration, whose formal mandate expired in late 2021. Dbeibeh argues his mandate did not expire because UN-backed national elections scheduled for December 2021 — and which would have abolished his separate administration — were cancelled.

UN officials have been nervously watching the escalating tensions and military maneuvers in western Libya. On Saturday, the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) warned that the sudden movement of troops and heavy weapons could trigger new violence in Libya’s capital. It stated the situation poses “potential harm” to civilians.

UN officials have urged restraint and a return to dialogue between Dbeibeh’s defense ministry and the militias he is trying to constrain. UNSMIL added that any new conflict risks not only the safety of the capital but also the potential for violence to spread across the country, “leading to a ‘lose-lose’ war that would critically endanger civilians.” The UN’s warnings appeared well-founded when, on Tuesday, a suicide attacker detonated a vehicle full of explosives at the main gate of the defense ministry’s 444th Brigade’s headquarters in Bani Walid.

Experts assess that additional pressure from outside powers, as well as from civilian leaders, might hold off an armed conflict. The Saturday UNSMIL statement noted a political dialogue among the contending factions on new security arrangements had “shown progress since June,” but that the recent military movements risk derailing those efforts. Libyan sources said that mediation was underway to dissuade Dbeibah from steps that could trigger confrontation in Tripoli, with both domestic and international actors pressing him to exercise restraint.

The so-called “5+5 Joint Military Committee” — a body set up to de-escalate military tensions after Haftar’s failed 2019 offensive — urged all armed units to return to their designated bases. The Committee called on all sides to refrain from unilateral actions and uphold ceasefire obligations, describing them as essential to protecting civilians and sustaining the political process.

UN officials are also expecting Türkiye to use its extensive leverage on all factions in western Libya to de-escalate tensions. Ankara is the leading supporter and weapons supplier of the Tripoli government, but it has also armed the militia units Dbeibeh is trying to constrain. The militias were instrumental in turning back Haftar’s 2019 offensive, and Ankara continues to see irregular forces as integral to Tripoli’s ability to deter another push by Haftar on the capital. Some Turkish troops have been based at Mitiga Airport to help secure the base and the prison there.

Ankara has rebuffed Dbeibeh’s insistence that the Turkish forces depart Mitiga, a withdrawal that would render the militias at Mitiga vulnerable. Sources in Tripoli report that Turkish forces continue their routine activity inside the base — a clear message from Ankara to Dbeibah not to storm Mitiga Airport.

But, aside from trying to deter Dbeibeh from using force against militias at Mitiga, Turkish officials do not appear actively engaged in diplomacy with the various factions in western Libya to try to de-escalate tensions there. Turkish officials have been focused on engaging Haftar and his allies in Benghazi in an effort to diversify Ankara’s alliances in Libya and promote Turkish strategic interests in the eastern Mediterranean.

Haftar is reportedly set to visit Türkiye later in September, providing Turkish leaders with an opportunity to lobby him to urge the eastern Libyan House of Representatives (HoR, parliament) to ratify the 2019 maritime agreement between Türkiye and the GNU. A ratification by the HoR would bring the maritime deal into force. Greece and Egypt oppose that agreement as too favorable to Türkiye and an infringement on the separate 2020 maritime deal between Greece and Egypt.

The UN’s warnings, dialogue among Libyan factions, and Ankara’s efforts to deter a military move by Dbeibeh all face significant hurdles in the face of the Tripoli Prime Minister’s determination to consolidate his authority in the west. In an interview with Libya’s al-Ahrar TV channel published Monday, Dbeibeh stressed: “We are continuing our security plan. We will not back down from eliminating militias and armed formations. Whoever does not want war to be declared against them must abide by the state, its institutions and laws.”

He explained the militias had refused offers to join the formal military institutions, and he characterized them as “criminal gangs” whose insistence on remaining autonomous constituted a “coup against the state…” Dbeibeh claimed the militias were better armed than government forces, including operating combat aircraft, and he accused militia leaders of using their armed formations to “blackmail official institutions.”

Dbeibeh stated the government’s policy is clear and that “all ports and airports will be affiliated with the relevant state institutions,” adding: “The time has come to take back the state, and we will not leave any airport, port or prison outside the state’s control.” Dbeibah’s insistence on consolidating control of armed forces in western Libya, including using force if necessary, seems to justify the pessimism expressed by many global diplomats that Libya can be stabilized and unified any time soon.

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Karim Mezran and Dario Cristiani

On August 21, the United Nations Special Representative for Libya, Hanaa Tetteh, presented a new roadmap to the UN Security Council aimed at reviving the country’s stalled political process and offering a renewed prospect for stability after years of deadlock. The proposal comes at a time marked by widespread institutional distrust and growing public frustration, as Libyans grow weary of endless transitional phases that yield no tangible outcomes.

Against this backdrop, a significant political development unfolded in eastern Libya: General Khalifa Haftar recently appointed his son, Saddam Haftar, as Deputy General Commander of the Libyan National Army (LNA). He framed the move as part of the “General Commander’s Vision 2030” to modernize and enhance the military’s overall performance. Haftar also signaled that this was just the beginning of a broader restructuring involving appointments to “key positions.”

Soon after, the Libyan House of Representatives (HoR) unanimously approved Saddam Haftar’s promotion. The HoR also appointed Lieutenant General Abdelrazek Al-Nadouri as National Security Advisor, removing him from his post as Chief of Staff of the eastern forces. His replacement? Khaled Haftar, another of the general’s sons.

The fact that the appointment came just days before the UN announced its new roadmap aimed at guiding Libya toward elections and a unified government is, to say the least, notable. The developments also come amid a growing rapprochement between Haftar and Turkey, despite a history of tensions.

The developments may well set the stage for a potential power shift in Tripoli. Notably, they suggest that Haftar is not only shaping the current political landscape, but is also positioning himself—and his family—for long-term strategic influence.

The UN roadmap

The UN roadmap is structured around three central goals: establishing a credible electoral framework, forming a new unified national government, and launching an inclusive dialogue that engages not only political elites but also youth, women, civil society, and marginalized communities. The core idea is that only a genuinely inclusive process can ensure legitimacy and address the root causes of the conflict.

The proposed timeline spans twelve to eighteen months. It is intended to avoid the same gridlocks that derailed the 2021 elections, which were not held in the end, despite being the most significant task that the interim Government of National Unity (GNU) established as a result of a UN-led process, which was supposed to be carried out.

Under this new plan, initial efforts will focus on strengthening the High National Electoral Commission, addressing leadership gaps, and resolving legal and political disputes that have obstructed voting over the past decade. Once these foundational steps are secured, attention will turn to forming a unified government responsible for guiding the country toward elections.

A significant element of the plan is its grounding in prior consultations conducted by the UN, which included input from over 22,000 Libyan citizens. A clear message emerged from these discussions: the need to restore political legitimacy through elections and move beyond institutions widely seen as ineffective and lacking credibility.

While “free and fair” elections are a cornerstone of any democratic system, in Libya’s current context, national elections—particularly in the short term—could risk exacerbating instability rather than resolving it. Though local elections were recently held, the event passed largely unnoticed. The UN marked it as a positive step, as the recorded turnout was considered significant (71 percent). Yet only twenty-six out of sixty-three municipalities participated, so the turnout concerned only the municipalities that actually voted.

This underscores that popular enthusiasm for elections is far from universal, and that entrenching forces fighting for the maintenance of the status quo are still very powerful and capable of spoiling the electoral process. At the moment, Libya remains divided into two, competing governments: the Government of National Unity (GNU) in the West, which – as mentioned above – was supposed to be an interim executive whose main task was to prepare elections in 2021 but which has remained in office since, and the eastern, non-recognized government backed by the forces of Khalifa Haftar and the HoR, the Parliament elected in 2014 whose speaker is Aguila Saleh.

While acknowledging the need to work with existing power structures until new institutions are in place, Tetteh warned that the path forward will be fraught with resistance and potential attempts at sabotage. In light of these challenges, she urged members of the Security Council to remain united and resolute, emphasizing the importance of holding accountable those who obstruct progress. In her words, the roadmap represents “a real opportunity” to restore legitimacy and stability in Libya—an opportunity to end the cycle of perpetual transitions and lay the groundwork for state reconstruction after more than a decade of fragmentation.

Haftar’s power grab and Turkey’s

emerging influence

All of Haftar’s sons now occupy senior positions in eastern Libya, both in military and economic spheres. Among them, Saddam is widely perceived as the heir apparent. His latest promotion cements his status within the family’s power structure, effectively positioning him as a crown prince and the most likely political and military successor to his father. The significance of this move is amplified by persistent speculation surrounding General Haftar’s advanced age and health.

Saddam’s elevation coincides with his increasingly visible international presence. In recent months, he has undertaken a series of high-level diplomatic visits on behalf of his father. In July, he traveled to Islamabad to meet with Pakistan’s army chief, General Asim Munir, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to discuss defense cooperation and naval relations. Earlier in the year, he visited Washington for meetings with US State Department officials; Rome, where he met with Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto; and Cairo, where he discussed military and security coordination with Egyptian Chief of Staff Ahmed Fathi Khalifa.

Perhaps the most notable visit was to Turkey, marking the first direct military engagement between the Haftar family and Ankara. In Istanbul, Saddam met with Turkish Defense Minister Yaşar Güler and Chief of Staff Selçuk Oğuz.

In a context marked by endemic fragmentation and deep political-institutional polarization, Saddam’s appointment was met with mixed reactions. As expected, the decision was welcomed by leaders in the eastern part of the country, many of whom remain closely—perhaps even literally—tied to General Haftar’s will. Conversely, it sparked concern and criticism among factions aligned with the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity (GNU).

Just days after the UN announcement, on August 25, General Haftar hosted Ibrahim Kalin, head of Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MIT), in Benghazi. Alongside Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Kalin is widely seen as one of President Erdoğan’s most powerful and trusted figures. His decision to visit Benghazi—without stopping in Tripoli—was highly symbolic. The day before, the Turkish Navy corvette TCG Kınalıada (F-514) docked in Benghazi, where it was received by Saddam Haftar. This marked the first visit by a Turkish warship to eastern Libya, a region firmly under Haftar’s control.

Also on August 25, Khaled Haftar met with US Chargé d’Affaires Jeremy Berndt, currently the highest-ranking American official in Libya following the end of Richard Norland’s term as Special Envoy this past May. Their meeting focused on the US–Libya security partnership. Berndt emphasized the importance of “unifying Libya’s military and security institutions and promoting long-term stability for the Libyan people,” adding that the United States “will continue to engage with security leaders across Libya.”

Our Libyan sources on the ground reported that on the same day, General Haftar also held meetings with representatives from Turkey, France, the United States, and Italy. This series of engagements further confirms the diplomatic momentum Haftar has cultivated in recent months, especially with respect to Turkey. The timing of both his “dynastic” appointments and these high-level diplomatic contacts together suggests Haftar’s aims of establishing a long-term hold on power for himself and his family.

For the current leadership in Tripoli, these developments present serious challenges. Prime Minister Abdelhamid Dbeibah of the Government of National Unity (GNU) has paradoxically seen his political space narrow since the killing of Abdel Ghani al-Kikli (known as “Ghaniwa”) in May. In the weeks following al-Kikli’s death, it became increasingly clear that the militias supposedly underpinning Dbeibah’s control over Tripoli and its surroundings are more autonomous—and less loyal—than previously assumed. In fact, the local militias determined the width of the clashes and their maximum profundity, halting the battle when more convenient for them.

At the same time, Turkey was operating another strategic turn by pursuing more decisively a rapprochement with its eastern Mediterranean main rival, Egypt. This brilliant diplomatic action clearly showed Ankara’s pragmatic approach in the Mediterranean towards old foes, although the road to full cooperation with Cairo is still bumpy.

After years of tension, sparked by the ousting of President Mohammed Morsi in 2013 and the rise to power of General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to power, bilateral political and diplomatic strains had long limited Ankara and Cairo’s collaboration on regional crises across Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean, with Libya being an obvious case in point. However, as a result of the war in Gaza, Turkey and Egypt began working to end a decade of hostility, opening the gates for cooperation on new strategies to tackle enduring crises. Even so, regional rivalries, conflicting loyalties, and the role of other external actors still complicate cooperation.

In Libya, it is becoming evident that, rather than aligning with specific actors, Turkey appears focused on outcomes: securing acceptance of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on the Exclusive Economic Zone, winning contracts for Libya’s reconstruction, and leveraging Libya as a strategic counterweight to Greek-Cypriot-French efforts to isolate Turkey in the Eastern Mediterranean.

The MoU is Turkey’s most significant interest in Libya. If both governments in Libya agree on that, this would be Turkey’s best guarantee against any attempts from regional rivals to isolate it and undermine its interests in energy exploration. Indeed, this MoU was crucial for Ankara’s military intervention in November 2019, as it happened only after the then Government of the National Accord (GNA) signed this MoU in return for Turkey’s military assistance against Haftar’s forces.

In the short term, Turkey will likely encourage both Libya’s western and eastern factions to reach a compromise and form a power-sharing government. However, from a longer-term perspective, the outlook for Dbeibah appears significantly less favorable.

With the decisions made in recent days, Haftar has cemented dynastic control over the eastern forces, making it clear that he and his family dominate the security apparatus in Cyrenaica. Dbeibah, by contrast, cannot claim the same level of control in the west, as he remains dependent on the support of Tripolitania militias—rather than commanding them. Actually, even more correct would be to say that his power position depends in good part on the goodwill of the militias, but mostly thanks to the Turkish army stationed in the western territory. Not really a popular endorsement or a clear-cut legitimacy.

In this context, once the probable power-sharing arrangement brings Haftar and his allies in Tripoli, his firm grip on the eastern forces could be used to assert control over the capital, as well. Whether that control is achieved through negotiation or coercion will depend on the response of militias in Tripoli and Misrata—and on the interests of key external actors, particularly Turkey, in that evolving scenario.

Turkey likely remains the only actor capable of setting real limits on Haftar’s ambitions. Yet, as recent developments demonstrate, Ankara has shown a willingness to engage with eastern factions—particularly after Haftar and his inner circle began aligning more closely with Turkish strategic interests. After his failed blitzkrieg on Tripoli in 2019–2020–repelled only by decisive Turkish military intervention—Haftar may now find himself entering the capital not through force, but through diplomacy. In a striking reversal, he could walk into Tripoli triumphantly—without firing a shot—thanks to this unexpected convergence with Ankara.

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Karim Mezran is the director of the North Africa Initiative and a resident senior fellow with the Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs at the Atlantic Council, focusing on the processes of change in North Africa. 

Dario Cristiani is a political risk consultant and an associate fellow at the Istituto Affari Internazionali global actors program in Rome. He is also a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund, working on Italian foreign policy, the Mediterranean, and global politics. 

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Didenur Daştan

Ankara’s balanced outreach to rival Tripoli and Benghazi factions seeks unity for Libya while navigating tensions with Greece over maritime rights, expert opines.

Türkiye is stepping up its outreach to Libya’s rival factions, seeking to balance ties with both Tripoli and Benghazi as it pushes for unity in the conflict-torn country while strengthening its influence in the Eastern Mediterranean.

A rare meeting this week between Turkish intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalın and eastern commander Khalifa Haftar marked Ankara’s first high-level contact with Benghazi in years. Libya has been divided since the NATO-backed uprising in 2011, with rival administrations in the east and west vying for power.

While Türkiye remains a key supporter of the U.N.-recognized government in Tripoli, it is now broadening engagement with Haftar’s camp, a move that reflects Ankara’s bid to help stabilize Libya without alienating either side, according to Murat Aslan, a security analyst at the Turkish think-tank Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research (SETA).

Policy of inclusion

The outreach comes as Libya’s political process remains stalled. Disputes over elections and a constitutional referendum continue between Tripoli-based leaders and the eastern parliament, while armed groups still wield influence across western Libya, often competing with one another.

Here, Türkiye has carved out a stabilizing role. Its military presence in western Libya has helped calm rival militias, while active coordination among Ankara’s Foreign Ministry, intelligence service, and defense officials has, according to Aslan, had “a constructive impact on Libya in such a situation.”

Central to Türkiye’s strategy, Aslan stressed, is engaging with all Libyan factions. “If you only meet with one side in any country, you reduce yourself to a position of supporting that side while alienating the other,” he said. “Türkiye is not making this mistake.”

He emphasized that Ankara’s outreach to Benghazi was done in coordination with Tripoli. “The initiative in Benghazi wasn’t undertaken to offend Tripoli. It’s being carried out in close coordination with Tripoli,” Aslan said.

For Ankara, the payoff lies not in military victories but in creating political space. “Such a political success is being achieved,” Aslan said. “It demonstrates the success of Türkiye’s Libya policy.”

Maritime stakes

That balancing act carries weight far beyond Libya’s borders. A core part of Ankara’s calculations is the 2019 agreement on the delimitation of maritime jurisdictions with Tripoli, a deal that expanded Türkiye’s reach in the Eastern Mediterranean but has yet to be ratified by Libya’s eastern-based parliament.

Aslan said Türkiye’s outreach to Benghazi could pave the way for that approval, a step that would strengthen Ankara’s hand against Greece and the European Union. “The maritime jurisdiction protocol between those two countries must also be ratified by the Assembly,” said Aslan. “If the Assembly in eastern Libya ratifies that agreement, Greece will no longer be able to mount a counterargument.”

Two historic rivals wrangling for influence in their region, Türkiye and Greece are also at odds over energy exploration in the Eastern Mediterranean, including Ankara’s deal with Libya, which allows Turkish ships to probe Libya’s territorial waters for hydrocarbons.

Kalın’s visit coincided with the docking of the Turkish navy corvette TCG Kınalıada in Benghazi and military-to-military talks between Turkish and Libyan delegations. Haftar’s son and deputy, Saddam Haftar, boarded the ship, highlighting the growing thaw between Ankara and the east.

For Türkiye, the outreach is part of what Aslan describes as a steady policy of engaging both sides. “Türkiye’s Libya policy essentially remains unchanged,” he said. “But Libya is currently de facto divided for certain other countries’ politics, which they intend to maintain. Türkiye is opposed to this and has taken steps to help achieve unity.” That effort has included reopening its consulate in Benghazi and welcoming Saddam Haftar at defense industry events in Istanbul. Such gestures, Aslan argued, “naturally led Haftar to align himself more closely with Türkiye.”

Waves in Athens, Cairo

The prospect of ratification, however, has sparked anxiety in Athens. Greek media described Kalın’s meeting with Haftar as a turning point, with Kathimerini declaring, “Ankara and Haftar are now closer together.”

For Greece, approval of the deal would strip away a key argument against the 2019 accord, which it insists is “illegitimate,” although its legal framework is based on international law. A Europost commentary went further, criticizing the Greek government for lacking a coherent strategy, warning that “Türkiye surrounds Greece from all sides.”

Ankara’s Libya moves are also closely tied to its normalization with Egypt. After years of strained ties, Türkiye and Cairo have largely restored relations, and Libya has become central to their dialogue. “When it comes to Khalifa Haftar and Libya, it’s necessary to delve into Turkish-Egyptian relations,” Aslan explained. “Because Egypt sees eastern Libya as crucial to its own security.”

If Ankara, Cairo, and Benghazi were to reach a trilateral understanding, Aslan argued, it could reshape the Eastern Mediterranean. “If Egypt, Libya, and Türkiye reach an agreement to share maritime jurisdictions in the region, this will bring peace to the ongoing Gaza war, the turmoil in Lebanon, Israel, and the Greek Cypriot administration,” he said.

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Fatih Mehmet Küçük

Türkiye strives for a ‘United and Single Libya’ through military, political and diplomatic support

The Second Libyan Civil War, which began in 2014 and lasted for approximately six and a half years, involved a power struggle that divided the country into two main axes. On one side is the U.N.-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA), based in Tripoli, while on the other is the House of Representatives (HoR) in the east, backed by the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by putschist Gen. Khalifa Haftar.

This internal conflict in Libya quickly turned into an international proxy war. Haftar’s forces received significant military and financial support from countries such as Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Russia, France and Saudi Arabia. These countries have supported Haftar through air strikes, mercenaries (Wagner Group) and the supply of weapons and ammunition. In contrast, the GNA, which holds international legitimacy, has received political and military support from countries such as Türkiye, Qatar, Italy and, to a lesser extent, the United Kingdom.

The long-running war reached a new turning point in 2019 when Haftar launched a major offensive to capture the capital, Tripoli, but failed due to Turkish support. The failure of the offensive and increased international mediation efforts forced the parties to seek a cease-fire. With the permanent cease-fire approved on Oct. 23, 2020, widespread fighting in Libya effectively came to an end. However, this did not mean that peace had been established. The end of the war was the result of a stalemate, as neither side achieved absolute military victory. Therefore, the peace process froze the fighting on the military fronts, leaving the resolution of underlying disputes to a political transition process.

Although armed struggle gave way to different conflicts, small-scale clashes continued throughout the country. For example, the capital, Tripoli, was shaken on May 12, 2025, by the outbreak of fighting between two powerful armed groups affiliated with the Government of National Unity: the 444th Infantry Brigade and the Stability Support Agency (SSA).

Triggered by the assassination of an SSA commander, the clashes resulted in at least eight civilian deaths and more than 70 injuries before a cease-fire was declared on May 14. These clashes are a critical indicator that the nature of the “civil war” has undergone a significant shift. The primary conflict is no longer a clear confrontation between East and West. Instead, it has become a complex, unpredictable struggle for power and influence within each faction’s own territory.

The internationally recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) formally requested military support from Türkiye on Dec. 26, 2019. In response to this request, the Turkish Parliament approved a presidential decree on Jan. 2, 2020, authorizing the deployment of troops to Libya. This decree granted the President the authority to deploy the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) in Libya for a period of one year, which has been extended in subsequent years. In addition to sending Turkish troops to Libya, it is known that various products developed by the Turkish defense industry, primarily the Bayraktar TB2, are being used in Libya.

5+5 Joint Military Committee

Türkiye provides comprehensive support in the political and military fields to achieve the goal of a “United and Single Libya.” This support is carried out through military talks, technical delegation visits and naval activities.

A key aspect of the cooperation between Turkey and Libya is the 5+5 Joint Military Committee (JMC) talks. These meetings were held in Ankara in 2021 and 2024. In December 2021, during a meeting held by the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), steps that could be taken to promote peace and stability in Libya were discussed, and information was shared about the Action Plan announced in Geneva on Oct. 8, 2021.

Another meeting in November 2024 focused on additional steps to promote Libya’s peace, stability, and security. The talks emphasized the importance of Libya’s territorial integrity and national unity. Statements made by Libya indicated that Türkiye approached the matter not with a colonialist attitude, but with a friendly and supportive stance. These meetings confirmed both sides’ commitment to the goal of a “United and Single Libya.”

Agreement on intelligence sharing

The establishment of relations between Türkiye and Libya has not been limited to the military sphere. In this context, an agreement was signed in October 2024 to develop intelligence sharing and law enforcement cooperation. The agreement outlines cooperation in areas such as counterterrorism and the prevention of organized crime. The signed agreement establishes a secure communication channel for the real-time sharing of intelligence between Turkish and Libyan law enforcement agencies.

In addition, under the agreement, Türkiye commits to providing joint training programs and technical assistance to modernize Libya’s security infrastructure. In other words, Türkiye will provide logistical and technical support to Libyan law enforcement agencies to increase operational efficiency. Thus, in addition to efforts to restore Libya’s military stability, Türkiye is also working to ensure the country’s internal security.

Building contacts with LNA

In line with its determination to cooperate with all parties in Libya, Türkiye has also increased its contacts with the eastern-based Libyan National Army (LNA). In this context, on April 4, 2025, the son of Gen. Khalifa Haftar and Deputy Commander of the LNA, Col. Gen. Saddam Haftar, paid an official visit to Ankara to meet with Minister of National Defense Yaşar Güler. This visit was considered a “new, important strategic step” toward the goal of “ending the fratricidal conflict” and establishing a “United and Single Libya.”

During the visit, Hafter praised Türkiye’s operational experience, discipline and high technological capacity, emphasizing the competence of the TSK in border security. Following this visit, between June 15 and 28, 2025, three military technical delegations from eastern Libya conducted inspections at various military headquarters and training institutions in Türkiye.

Güler and Hafter also met at the IDEF 2025 Defense Industry Fair, where they continued their bilateral contacts. It is also worth noting that Saddam Hafter met Güler previously, when he attended the “Saha Expo 2024” International Defense and Space Fair, held on Oct. 22, 2024. In this regard, it is also possible to say that Libya is interested in Turkish defense industry products.

Turkish, Libyan navies side by side

Türkiye’s efforts to bring stability to Libya also continue by sea. In this context, the TCG Kınalıada corvette visited both the ports of Tripoli and Benghazi in August 2025. During the visit to the Port of Tripoli on Aug. 17-18, 2025, meetings were held with several high-level Libyan officials, including the Libyan minister of Defense, the chief of the general staff, and the commander of the navy. It is stated that these visits demonstrate Türkiye’s inclusive approach to its “One Libya” goal and its determination to develop relations with all Libyan officials.

In addition, the Turkish Naval Task Group operating off the coast of Libya conducted various training exercises with the Libyan Navy and students from the Libyan Naval Academy. Such training exercises are interpreted as another element supporting Türkiye’s efforts in the region.

Türkiye’s ambassador to Tripoli, Güven Begeç (2nd R), visited the TCG Kınalıada Corvette and met with naval commanders in Tripoli, Libya, Aug. 17, 2025. (AA Photo)

From support to partnership

Türkiye’s involvement in the Second Libyan Civil War has not only changed the course of the conflict but has also been a strategic move that reshaped the regional equation in the Eastern Mediterranean. The main motivations for the intervention can be summarized as Libya’s geopolitical and economic potential, as well as the prevention of policies that exclude Türkiye in the Eastern Mediterranean.

The most critical impact on the ground was the transformation of the conflict dynamics in favor of the GNA, as Turkish UAVs targeted Khalifa Haftar’s forces’ air superiority and logistical lines. This military success paved the way for Haftar’s defeat and a lasting cease-fire. In this context, Türkiye’s actions in Libya constitute an important case study demonstrating the impact of technological superiority on proxy forces in modern warfare.

Recently, Türkiye’s role in Libya has evolved from a military presence to an economic and political partnership. Military support has paved the way for a political solution, laying the groundwork necessary for Türkiye to maintain its economic and political influence in the long term. Although the political process in Libya remains uncertain, Türkiye’s steps reflect a multifaceted and determined foreign policy approach that integrates hard and soft power elements. This strategy supports Türkiye’s goal of increasing its power and influence in the region.

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Hanaa Mohamed

According to the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), at least 60 people have been arbitrarily detained in the first half of 2024 alone.

For more than a year, Jumaa al-Darsi, 40, has scoured Benghazi and beyond for any trace of his brother, Libyan lawmaker Ibrahim al-Darsi, 47, who disappeared in Benghazi in 2024, after attending a military parade marking the tenth anniversary of “the Dignity Revolution,” the uprising led by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, commander of the Tobruk-based Libyan National Army (LNA). 

Al-Darsi has knocked on doors and called in old favours. He has followed whispers and chased rumours. But every path has led to silence. His family still does not know why he was taken, or if he will ever come home. His brother’s disappearance is among the countless cases in Libya, where abductions have become a weapon against dissent, utilised by the rival factions and infighting militias that have carved up the country since 2011.

“We still cling to any hope of finding Ibrahim, but the security and human rights authorities aren’t cooperating with us on my brother’s case,” al-Darsi told The New Arab. “His situation remains unknown. We don’t know which entity or individuals kidnapped him or the reason behind it.”

According to the UN human rights office and United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), at least 60 people have been arbitrarily detained in the first half of 2024 alone for peacefully expressing their political views. The practice, entrenched under Muammar Gaddafi to muzzle critics, has endured even after his ouster through years of upheaval and division. 

Today, both the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity (GNU) and the eastern Government of National Stability (GNS), alongside their affiliated armed groups and militias, continue to detain opponents in secret locations, cutting them off from their families and denying them legal counsel. The UN has noted that “these unlawful practices have created a climate of fear, shrinking civic space, and eroding the rule of law.”

No safety in Libya

According to human rights activist Ahlam al-Warfali, the systematic violations committed by law enforcement and security agencies in detention centres and prisons in eastern and western Libya against activists, journalists, and human rights defenders constitute “crimes against humanity punishable under international law.”

“There’s no safety in Libya,” she said to TNA. “Everyone is vulnerable to kidnapping, torture, and sometimes killing, for refusing the presence of certain groups or publishing political posts criticising the current political landscape.” Media outlets and social media users had circulated photos and video footage reportedly of al-Darsi, showing him chained and stripped of his clothes in a secret prison in eastern Libya.

Al-Darsi refused to comment on the widely shared images, saying only: “My brother is still missing, and the security authorities aren’t providing us with any information about his condition or whereabouts.”

Most recently, the abduction of human rights activist Youssef al-Taweel in Misrata—seized from his workplace after he criticised Fathi Bashagha, the former interior minister in Fayez al-Sarraj’s Government of National Accord, the predecessor to the GNU, and a powerful militia leader who later rose to become prime minister under Libya’s Parliament in 2021—sent shockwaves through the city. “This confirms that Libya has neither freedom of opinion nor expression,” she added.

Security expert Mohamed al-Mahshash argues that impunity for perpetrators of these crimes increases the severity of these brutal acts, considering that security and executive agencies do not operate according to laws but according to orders and instructions they receive from dominating figures heads in either eastern or western Libya.

“These acts don’t only affect Libyans, activists, and journalists, but also foreigners, migrants, and asylum seekers, often committed out of revenge or to obtain confessions under duress, or based on political or ideological affiliation, despite repeated demands and calls for the necessity of putting an end to such operations,” he remarked. 

The Libyan watchdog Monitoring Crimes in Libya reported that in November, security forces linked to the GNU in Tripoli arrested more than 200 asylum seekers, mostly Sudanese and Nigerian nationals, among them women and children.

The organisation also held the GNU responsible for the wave of arbitrary arrests, pointing most recently to the case of Abdel Moneim Rajab al-Marimi, a 51-year-old activist and journalist who died from severe injuries after falling from the third floor of the Public Prosecutor’s office in Tripoli. He had been seized in Tripoli in July by armed men and handed over to the Internal Security Agency over his critical political and human rights views. 

Social media users have also circulated in August leaked footage showing the conditions inside prisons run by the Special Deterrence Forces, known as Rada, a hard-line Islamist paramilitary unit that controls Mitiga International Airport. The videos appear to reveal the violence and torture inflicted on detainees within the airport. The group is also accused of torturing and killing Sharaf al-Din Hamdan, who had been arbitrarily detained for more than 11 years without trial. 

Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah’s government ordered an assault on Rada in May, after the militia affiliated with the Presidential Council had expanded its grip over parts of Tripoli. The government also demanded the release of all detainees held in its prisons without legal justification. But after the recent cease-fire, their fate remains uncertain. 

In a 6 July interview, Dbeibah insisted that the inmates of Mitiga prison be referred to the Office of the Attorney General and that control of Mitiga International Airport be transferred to the Ministry of Transport.

Unknown fates

Women, girls, and female human rights activists and journalists face enforced and arbitrary disappearance and various forms of torture, violence, and assault in the absence of legal protection for women. 

Among them is Libyan lawmaker Siham Sergiwa, who has been missing for more than six years, and whose alleged leaked photos recently reignited debate about her unknown fate since her kidnapping. The circulated images showed a body believed to be MP Sergiwa after being assaulted and killed by forces affiliated with the LNA in Benghazi.

These leaks sparked condemnation from the Council of Elders and Notables of Misrata over what Sergiwa was subjected to after being taken from her home and tortured. 

Council member Khalifa Lamloum told TNA that this act was committed by gangs operating outside the law, executing authorities’ instructions without recourse to law, calling on the Attorney General and judicial authorities to “open an investigation into the leaked photos, verify their authenticity, and urgently hold those involved accountable.”

“If these acts go unpunished, they will only entrench impunity and reinforce the dominance of armed force and violence,” al-Warfali warned. 

“There are no reliable figures on the kidnapped, detained, or missing across Libya, and the victims range from activists and journalists to community elders, targeted for their political or tribal affiliation or simply for views critical of the authorities in both east and west. Many are even coerced into recording false confessions to crimes that may not exist,” al-Warfali concluded. 

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Sema Kalaycioglu  

As of 2024, China has increased its interest in North Africa again and has started a comprehensive opening to the region, especially through Libya. Its approach based on the principle of political neutrality allows it to establish simultaneous relations with the Tobruk and Tripoli administrations. Within the framework of the Belt and Road Project, rail system, energy, infrastructure and port investments come to the fore, while high-cost initiatives such as the Benghazi Metro Project are a symbol of China’s return to Libya. …

Return to Libya

China’s interest in North Africa has increased again as of 2024. The Trump administration’s lack of focus on the region has paved the way for new initiatives for Beijing. With Libya, which needs support, meeting this interest, political and military contacts, especially economic projects, have started to revive since the spring of 2023. China’s Libya policy is based on the principle of political neutrality.

This approach offers the opportunity to establish simultaneous relations with the Tobruk and Tripoli administrations. Although it does not seem possible to achieve reconciliation between the two sides in the short term, it can contribute to the reduction of tensions through investments in housing, infrastructure, employment and industry.

In particular, the rail system investments to be initiated within the scope of the Belt and Road Project will not only strengthen the logistical ties between Tobruk and Tripoli, but will also enable regional integration for Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt, which has not been implemented for a long time. Thus, China will also gain access to new market opportunities.

Concrete project initiatives have been on the agenda under the umbrella of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum (CASCF) for the past year. China, which effectively used Libya’s influence on the African Union during the Gaddafi era, aims to revive this legacy by increasing its influence in Libya today. Although economic goals seem to be a priority in Beijing’s Libya policy, the political consequences cannot be ignored.

China’s orientation towards development projects simultaneously with Tobruk and Tripoli meets the common interest of different political groups within the country in the reconstruction processes. While this approach has the potential to reduce the influence of Western Europe in the region, it also carries the risk of the US-China rivalry moving to North Africa via Libya. In this context, it remains unclear whether Washington will turn to an intervention again.

Multiple Projects and Investment Areas

China is acting with a long-term strategy rather than taking unplanned steps in Libya. It has simultaneously submitted project proposals to central and local governments and diversified them. Within the framework of the Belt and Road Project, infrastructure investments, renewable energy initiatives, renewal of oil pipelines, increasing refinery capacities and port construction are prominent topics.

In eastern Libya, the Libyan Fund for Development and Reconstruction, established by Khalifa Haftar to rebuild the infrastructure destroyed by the floods, is trying to attract Chinese investments to the country. In this context, the Chinese BFI Consortium has put solar power plants, water treatment plants and railway line projects that will connect Benghazi to the city of Musaid on the border with Egypt on the agenda.

In addition, the Benghazi Metro Project, which is planned to be largely financed by China and whose cost is estimated to be 24-30 billion euros, draws attention. The implementation of the project in cooperation with China Railways International Group Company (CRI), Germany’s Siemens and Britain’s Arup International Engineering Company will be one of the first examples of China-Europe partnership in North Africa. In addition, housing and workplace projects in Derna and Benghazi have also come to the fore.

Security Dimension

For China, Libya is important not only economically but also geopolitically. It has a strategic location, especially in terms of being an alternative to the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) announced in 2023.

In this context, China has included Algeria and Tunisia in the scope of the Belt and Road Project. Excluding Turkey from IMEC may make it attractive for Ankara to support China’s expansion into North Africa. However, the fact that Turkey’s military presence in Libya remains relatively in the background makes the possibility in this direction uncertain.

China’s opening up to Africa is not limited to economic initiatives; The security dimension is also becoming more and more prominent. Beijing, which has developed military and security cooperation with more than 100 countries within the framework of the Global Security Initiative, carries out military training activities with Egypt, Algeria and Sudan. Although there is no clear agenda for direct arms sales yet, this possibility cannot be ruled out in the long term. The concretization of China-Libya military cooperation in the near future is not limited to Libya but can reshape the balances in North Africa.

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Faisal Edroos

National Security Adviser Ibrahim Dbeibah, a relative of Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, has quietly held talks with Israeli officials over deal that would see US release $30bn in frozen assets, sources say

A senior official in Libya’s internationally recognised government has held talks with Israeli officials over a proposal to resettle hundreds of thousands of Palestinians expelled from Gaza, multiple sources have told Middle East Eye.

Speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the issue, Libyan, Arab and European officials told MEE that National Security Adviser Ibrahim Dbeibah, a relative of Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, was spearheading the talks despite Palestinians in Gaza flatly rejecting US President Donald Trump’s postwar plan for the enclave.

One Libyan source said that “practical talks” had already taken place but the specifics were vague. “The mechanisms and implementation have not yet been spoken about,” the source said. Another Libyan source said that discussions were still ongoing and that members of the Tripoli-based parliament were deliberately being kept in the dark as pro-Palestine sentiment runs deep in the country.

The source said that in an attempt to placate some Libyan leaders, the US was prepared to confer economic support or other benefits in exchange for the country taking in Palestinians. The source said that Ibrahim Dbeibah had already received guarantees that the US Department of Treasury would release some $30bn in frozen state assets.

In May, separate sources had told MEE that Massad Boulos, an adviser to Trump and father-in-law to his daughter Tiffany, had held discussions with Ibrahim Dbeibah about unlocking billions of dollars in sanctioned frozen wealth funds.

The assets were frozen in early 2011 by former US President Barack Obama, several months before the Nato-backed ouster of Muammar Gaddafi. Boulos flatly denied that he was involved in talks over the resettlement of Palestinians, telling MEE that the reports were “inflammatory and totally false”.

However, White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly said that Trump had “long advocated for creative solutions to improve the lives of Palestinians, including allowing them to resettle in a new, beautiful location while Gaza rebuilds”.

Seeking legitimacy from the US

The idea of Libya serving as a possible new home for expelled Palestinians comes amid reports that Khalifa Haftar, a powerful military leader who also oversees a rival rubber-stamp parliament in the country’s east, was offered greater control over the country’s oil resources if he agreed to resettle hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.

Haftar, who has played a seminal role in the widespread destruction and instability in Libya, as well as the ensuing civil war in neighbouring Sudan, has denied the reports. Meanwhile on Monday, hours after receiving a request for comment from MEE on the issue of resettling Palestinians, Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah said that his government would not engage in the “crime” of resettling Palestinians.

He reiterated a line from a statement by the US embassy in Tripoli in May which dismissed reports that Washington was pursuing a relocation plan for Palestinians in Libya. Israel has publicly mulled expelling Palestinians from Gaza and last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israeli officials were in contact with “several countries” about absorbing displaced civilians from the war-torn territory.

“I think this is the most natural thing,” Netanyahu said. “All those who are concerned for the Palestinians and say they want to help the Palestinians should open their doors to them. What are you preaching to us for? We’re not pushing them out – we’re enabling them to leave… first of all, [leaving] combat zones, and also the Strip itself, if they want to.”

Recently, Israel’s Agriculture Minister, Avi Dichter, singled out Libya as “the ideal destination” for Palestinians saying they would “happily leave” Gaza if the necessary international support was provided. “Libya is a huge country, with vast areas and a coastline similar to Gaza’s,” he said. “If the world invests billions to rehabilitate Gazans there, the host country will also benefit economically.”

Israeli officials have long advocated expelling Palestinians from Gaza and within a week of the 7 October attacks, Israel’s intelligence minister at the time, Gila Gamliel, presented the cabinet with her “voluntary migration plan” where she hoped 1.7 million Palestinians would leave the enclave. Forced displacement, as observed in Gaza, violates international humanitarian law, notably Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the forcible transfer of protected persons by an occupying power. 

The European source told MEE that Dbeibeh and Haftar were “simultaneously negotiating with the Israelis” in the hope of getting “more legitimacy from the Americans”. The source said that if the resettlement plan was forcibly imposed on Libya, Palestinians would find themselves moving out of the frying pan and into the fire. “It will be catastrophic at multiple levels,” the source said. 

“Firstly, for the Palestinians themselves, who would have just about made it out of the Strip alive and escaped an obliterated life in Gaza, facing forced expulsion to a country like Libya which is in deeply complicated political turmoil with divided governments, where systems and society is broken by its civil war.”

“The Palestinians will not be getting any care from those governments, which will push them to the following catastrophe, [which] will lead to a new wave of migration towards the shores of Europe. And this is also a scary thought, firstly because the past decades have proven to us that many of them will only make it halfway through the Mediterranean, like many of those boats that capsized. And those that would eventually get to Europe, I do not think that Europe would be welcoming of another one million Arabs arriving at its shores, as the Syrians who just made similar journeys just few years ago.”

The Arab official, who was intimately aware of the latest talks, warned that complicity in Israel’s ethnic cleansing plan could provoke widespread anger across all of Libya. “This will be a shock to the Libyan people,” he said. Mohamed Mahfouz, a Libyan political analyst, echoed his remarks, telling MEE that the US was acutely aware that discussions around Libya resettling Palestinians could cause great distress for Libyan authorities.

“Accepting Palestinians could come at a high price for any of the parties that will engage with the United States on this matter. This in itself may explain why neither [Libyan] government is yet to normalise relations.”

Outreach to Africa

In recent weeks Israeli officials have publicly said, then later denied, reaching out to leaders from across Africa and Asia to use their territories as potential destinations for expelling Palestinians. Plans have been mooted for Palestinians to be resettled in Sudan, South Sudan and the breakaway region of Somalia known as Somaliland, despite all of the territories being plagued by violence.

Sudan has been gripped by intense violence since its civil war broke out in 2023, with an estimated 150,000 people killed in the past two years. South Sudan has struggled to recover from a civil war that broke out after independence, with more than seven million people facing food insecurity and at least 2.3 million children at risk of malnutrition.

Meanwhile, Somaliland continues to face threats from the armed group al-Shabab over the region’s memorandum of understanding with Ethiopia – one of the greatest enemies of the group. A Libyan political analyst, who requested anonymity due to fear of reprisal attacks by government-aligned militias, said that it was “unsurprising” that Ibrahim Dbeibah was leading the outreach efforts with Israel.

“[Ibrahim] Dbeibah, like the Libyan government, is marked by self-interest. He is well aware of the benefits of ingratiating himself with the US and Trump.” While Libya does not officially recognise Israel, the Tripoli-based government, known officially as the Government of National Unity (GNU), is known to have held several secret meetings with Israeli officials in recent years.

In 2023, Najla al-Mangoush, then foreign minister under Dbeibah, secretly met Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen in Italy. The revelation sparked outrage in Libya, resulting in angry protests and her suspension. In a later interview with Al Jazeera Arabic, Mangoush claimed she had attended the meeting on direct orders from Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, and that it was coordinated between his government and Israel.

Arabic Post later reported that Ibrahim Dbeibah had orchestrated the meeting, citing unnamed sources. 

Middle East Eye reached out to the prime minister’s office and the GNU for comment but did not receive a response by time of publication.

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Hassuna Baishu

Under the scorching sun, Libyans wait in long lines at fuel stations, sometimes for hours or even days, just to buy a few liters for their cars or household generators.

Meanwhile, heavy oil tankers speed down highways toward ports, where smugglers load shipments bound for global markets.

Libya, one of the world’s major oil producers and home to Africa’s largest reserves, has seen generous subsidies turn fuel into a prime target for organized smuggling rather than a relief for its citizens.

Fuel smuggling drains an estimated $5 billion from Libya each year, according to the World Bank. More critically, revenues lost outside the state budget have become a key funding source for militias that control vital distribution routes, fueling the armed struggle for power.

In October 2024, a World Bank report noted that “southern Libyan regions repeatedly experience fuel shortages, with prices on the parallel market reaching 7 dinars per liter when available,” while the official price is less than 0.15 dinar.

“We cannot find fuel, and when it is available, it’s sold at higher prices because gas station owners trade it on the black market,” said Mohamed al-Sayyid, a resident of the southern city of Sabha.

With queues stretching outside the few stations that still open, many citizens return home with nearly empty tanks. Families, al-Sayyid explained, are forced to buy from smugglers at exorbitant prices to keep their cars and generators running — “while government subsidies remain only theoretical, with no tangible benefit for ordinary citizens in the south.”

The latest International Monetary Fund figures show Libya paid a steep price for energy subsidies in 2024, allocating $9 billion for fuel alone. The electricity sector — which uses part of that fuel — consumed several more billions.

“When the cost of domestically refined crude oil and natural gas used for power generation is added — estimated at $3.9 billion and $4 billion respectively — the total energy subsidy bill in 2024 reaches about $17 billion, or 35% of GDP,” the IMF said.

Sleepless Ships

On the eastern coast, Benghazi’s old port has become a hub of illicit trade, transformed into a complex center for organized fuel smuggling.

A 2024 United Nations expert report offered a stark picture of the port, controlled by the Libyan army. While Libyans live with chronic fuel shortages, large vessels remain busy, laden with smuggled oil.

The UN documented at least 137 smuggling operations between October 2022 and September 2024, involving 48 ships that called at the port more than 185 times. These were not small shipments: the average cargo per vessel rose from 5,700 tons to 9,970 tons of diesel, bringing the total smuggled volume to about 1.125 million tons.

The ships were often chartered or carried no clear registration, relying on forged or fictitious documents, the report said.

“Benghazi port now reflects a different equation: a strategic location that should support the national economy but has instead become a lifeline for fuel smuggling to foreign markets,” political analyst Ahmed al-Saadi told Alhurra.

Since May 2022, the National Oil Corporation has filed repeated complaints with the prosecutor general about fuel smuggling to Turkey, Spain, Malta and Italy via vessels such as the Queen Majeda, which was seized in Albania carrying shipments worth more than $2 million, al-Saadi added.

“The continuation of this pattern means the port operates with two faces: an official, public activity and another illegal one under the table, doubling state losses and adding pressure on citizens who stand daily in fuel queues.”

In western Libya, smuggling also flourishes through coastal towns such as Zuwara, Zawiya, Sabratha and Khoms.

A 2023 United Nations expert report documented several maritime smuggling cases and identified routes including Sidi Ali near the Tunisian border.

“The situation in Khoms, Zuwara, Zawiya and Sabratha reflects a recurring pattern,” al-Saadi said. “Fuel allocations meant for citizens are diverted through intermediaries to smugglers, who transport them by land toward Tunisia or by sea across the Mediterranean.”

Al-Saadi warned that these towns will remain hubs of the shadow economy — funding armed groups and undermining stability — unless strict oversight is imposed on distribution chains and ports.

Barter Deals: Fuel Outside the Budget

Until 2021, Libya’s central bank imposed a strict ceiling on fuel import allocations, leaving the National Oil Corporation (NOC) up against a financial wall each year.

“Often these allocations ran out before year’s end, and the bank refused the NOC’s requests for more, citing budget violations. This happened amid volatile oil production and low prices, causing liquidity crises and foreign currency shortages alongside rising domestic demand for fuel,” economist Mohamed al-Safi told Alhurra.

To cover the shortfall, the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity authorized the NOC to use a mechanism known as “barter,” exchanging crude oil with intermediaries for refined fuel delivered directly to Libya without cash payments.

“The barter system was fast and effective in supplying fuel, bypassing bureaucratic hurdles such as financial approvals and transfers,” al-Safi said. “But the fuel Libya obtained was not officially recorded in the state budget or accounts.”

“The absence of accurate data on quantities or value opened the door to a lack of transparency and corruption,” he added.

The Libyan Audit Bureau’s 2021 report noted that the National Oil Corporation “exported crude shipments without collecting revenues, instead swapping them for fuel outside the state budget without disclosing the process to the Ministry of Finance.”

The report also said the NOC delayed collecting taxes and royalties from foreign companies worth 10.4 billion dinars that should have been counted as 2021 revenue.

Warnings continued. In its 2023 report, the bureau revealed that spending on subsidized fuel purchases had more than doubled, rising from $2.9 billion (16 billion dinars) in 2021 to more than $7.6 billion (41 billion dinars) in 2023, justified as covering market demand and power plants.

In January 2025, the prosecutor general intervened, sending an official letter to the NOC demanding an end to the barter system. The mechanism was suspended after an agreement between the central bank, the Audit Bureau and the NOC, which created a committee to review all crude-for-fuel transactions during 2024.

War on the Western Coast

Along Libya’s western coast, a silent, undeclared war has raged since mid-2023. Using Turkish drones, forces aligned with the Tripoli government have launched repeated airstrikes on suspected fuel smuggling and storage sites, particularly in Zawiya, home to the country’s largest refinery and a key export port.

The most recent strike took place in August 2025. But images and videos posted by activists on social media showed some raids hitting not only alleged smuggling dens but also residential neighborhoods and civilian facilities. With Tripoli remaining silent, suspicions grew over the campaign’s motives. Observers described it as politically driven, aimed at eliminating militias believed to be loyal to the eastern-based Libyan National Army.

“The airstrikes on smuggling hideouts deterred some armed groups, but they weren’t enough,” political analyst Ibrahim Belqasim told Alhurra.

“There is selectivity in these campaigns. They target groups opposed to Prime Minister Dbeibah’s government, while pro-government militias receive clear military and logistical support, including uniforms, weapons and training,” Belqasim added.

He linked this selectivity to the absence of army and security institutions in western Libya since Abdulhamid Dbeibah came to power, fueling militia dominance in cities such as Zawiya.

Jalal al-Haroushi, a Libya expert at the Royal United Services Institute, was even more skeptical. He argued the campaign lacked credibility from the outset because armed groups were notified in advance of strike times.

Writing on X, al-Haroushi added that Zawiya refinery has been under the control of Dbeibah’s political rivals, the Awlad Bu Hamira tribe, since 2013 — making the strikes less about combating smuggling and more about local power struggles.

Subsidy Reform: Shock or

Gradual Change?

At the start of 2024, talk of lifting Libya’s fuel subsidies moved from rumor to public declaration.

Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah presented the step as necessary to “stop smuggling losses” and stabilize the market. He sought to reassure citizens with three proposed compensation mechanisms: direct cash payments, salary increases, or fuel cards with limited subsidized amounts.

In the east, the position was similar despite political divisions. Parliament-appointed Prime Minister Osama Hammad’s government endorsed ending subsidies but gave no clear timetable.

Public protests and political criticism, however, were swift. In Tripoli, Benghazi and even smaller towns, fear of rising prices dominated daily discussions.

Economists argue that any subsidy reform in Libya must be gradual, paired with compensation for low-income groups and tighter controls on borders and ports to curb smuggling. Others contend a “shock” approach would be more effective for security, swiftly cutting off smuggling networks.

“Gradual subsidy removal has economic benefits. Studies show the inflation from a one-year shock equals the inflation from gradual removal over five years. Gradualism allows citizens to diversify income and adapt to inflation, while shock may push them below the poverty line,” economist Mohamed al-Safi explained.

“The shock method, however, has security advantages, as some politicians argue. It cuts off legal profiteers from subsidies and contains street anger that could pressure the government to back down. But Libya needs a study to determine which option is best,” he said.

Caught between sacrificing the familiar and risking the unknown, Libyans fear the reforms may be a false mask hiding deeper deterioration in living conditions. They face a stark choice: accept a decision that could curb corruption draining the country’s wealth but add a heavy economic burden amid weak guarantees — or remain trapped in a cycle of crises fueled by smuggling networks, with cheap fuel continuing to drive an endless national crisis.

***

Hassuna Baishu – Libyan journalist based in Washington with over a decade of experience in strategic communications and media work across the United States, the Middle East, and North Africa. He has worked with international and media organizations including Voice of America, the Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN), and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), focusing on Libya and regional politics.

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Mohammed Amin

In June, the Rapid Support Forces captured Sudan’s wild border frontier with Libya and Egypt. This is how they did it.

On 10 June, Ismail Hassan, an artisanal gold miner and trader in the triangle border region that straddles Sudan, Egypt and Libya, watched as more than 250 fully equipped military vehicles entered his local market, al-Katma. The vehicles carried fighters from the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the Sudanese paramilitary group that has been at war with Sudan’s army since April 2023, alongside a host of Libyan mercenary groups connected to the eastern military commander Khalifa Haftar.  

“The RSF and Libyan forces entered the area and advanced into the market, declaring control of the region,” Hassan told Middle East Eye, referring to the Sudanese part of the triangle.  The Libyans then moved out, Hassan said, leaving the RSF to loot the area’s markets, making off with gold, money, cars, mobile phones and much more. 

Hassan was one of many miners who fled the area following the attack, before speaking exclusively about it to MEE over the phone.  The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and their allied Joint Forces militia were forced to leave in the wake of the RSF-led attack. Two days later, on 12 June, the RSF announced that it successfully taken “control of the strategic Almuthallath ‘triangle’ area, which constitutes a pivotal junction between Sudan, Libya and Egypt”. 

As the army has taken Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, and made inroads in other parts of central Sudan, the takeover of the Sudanese part of the border triangle region has cemented the RSF’s hold on western Sudan, where it holds almost all of Darfur. According to satellite imagery, flight tracking data seen by MEE, and interviews with gold miners and other eyewitnesses, this success in the wild, lawless border regions would not have been possible without Haftar’s Libyan forces and the patronage of the United Arab Emirates and Russia. 

The involvement of the UAE has brought Abu Dhabi into further conflict with Egypt, which has tried – and so far failed – to mediate better relations between Haftar and Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the head of the Sudanese Armed Forces. At the beginning of July, MEE revealed a secret meeting hosted by Egypt between the Sudanese general and the Libyan commander, both of whom are its allies. The meeting did not go well.

RSF attack

Key to the RSF’s capture of the Sudanese part of the triangle region was Subul al-Salam, a Libyan militia affiliated with Haftar’s forces. A cousin of Hassan, who works with him as a gold miner and trader, told MEE that forces from Subul al-Salam “helped the RSF until it reached the market and controlled the entire area”. 

He said that the group, alongside RSF fighters, carried out ethnically motivated killings. Another miner, Abu Zar, said there were Libyan fighters inside the main market at al-Katma. He told MEE that an armed group called the Tariq Ben Zeyad brigade, which is believed to be controlled by Saddam Haftar, Khalifa’s son, was also part of the attack on the triangle border region.

“We heard that Saddam Haftar, the strong son of the Libyan commander, was closely monitoring the military operation before he ordered the forces to withdraw back to Libyan territory,” another miner, who asked for anonymity, said. The RSF then advanced into Sudan’s northern state, seizing Karb al-Toum, an oasis near the Jebel Arkenu mountain range, as well as a host of other small villages. 

The Joint Forces – Darfur rebels fighting alongside the Sudanese army – were forced to withdraw from areas in the northern desert, while some of them had to retreat through Egypt alongside army soldiers. It was reported that RSF fighters also crossed the border into Egypt but that they were ordered by senior commanders to withdraw.

The UAE’s project

Libyan sources, Sudanese officials and a former US diplomat all told MEE that Haftar’s forces and the RSF had been given the green light and logistical support from the UAE to take control of the triangle border region. Though it denies it, the UAE has been the RSF’s main patron throughout the war in Sudan.

An unpublished study leaked to MEE by a Libyan researcher reported that two Emirati planes landed at southeastern Libya’s al-Kufra airport on 10 July, unloading weapons and supplies that were then transported to the RSF in Darfur through the Chadian-Libyan border. The dossier revealed that the UAE ordered Haftar to move his Libyan National Army (LNA) forces from Camp 87 in Benghazi to support the RSF “with hundreds of vehicles in its attack on the SAF and Darfur rebels in the desert”. 

This movement of Haftar’s forces comes partly in response to resistance in Chad to the continued supply of the RSF through the country’s desert regions. A Libyan source close to the issue, who did not want to be named, said the “recent interference by Haftar through its allied militia Subul al-Salam” had changed the balance of power in the triangle region, which has a Sudanese, Libyan and Egyptian component. 

Egypt, the source said, was “looking suspiciously at the UAE and Haftar”, with the region vital to Cairo’s national security. “Subul al-Salam matters, but this is an Emirati project,” Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst focusing on Libya, told MEE. “The big event is the fact that the RSF now controls the Sudanese part of the triangle… Subul al-Salam was instrumental because the Libyan part of the triangle was very permissive until mid-May. The SAF, the Joint Forces and civilians from Egypt were all able to access it.” 

“What was necessary, as preliminary step, was for Subul al-Salam to shut all of that down – and this is how the RSF was able to use that platform to carry out that incursion and take over the Sudanese part of the triangle,” Harchaoui said. Former US diplomat and CIA expert Cameron Hudson believes the UAE is still working to ensure the victory of the RSF in Sudan’s war. 

“The RSF’s control of its border areas will worsen and extend Sudan’s war, making it even more difficult to resolve. This has been the UAE’s plan, not just in Libya, but in Chad, the Central African Republic, and South Sudan. Control of borders gives them free access to weapons, to recruit fighters and to smuggle out gold,” Hudson, who is also a senior associate at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies Africa programme, told MEE.  

“It is no coincidence that the UAE maintains bases in all these countries near the border with Sudan to help facilitate that military and economic trade,” he said. Libyan researcher and political analyst Islam Alhaj said that the UAE was exploiting the security vacuum in southern Libya to send the weapons to the RSF and support other illegal activities, including gold smuggling, in the region. 

Russian planes

Satellite imagery reported by Nova Italian news agency disclosed that two Russian-made cargo planes were recently tracked flying from al-Kufra airport to RSF areas in Sudan. According to previous reporting by MEE and the imagery provided by the Copernicus programme, the IL-76 plane is typically used for transporting military personnel and equipment, as well as for medium-range logistical operations.

The shipment was part of an Emirati-directed flow of arms shipments from southeastern Libya to the RSF that has been in operation since May, a month before the paramilitary’s capture of the Sudanese part of the border triangle. Harchaoui told MEE that the “brand new phenomenon” was the act of flying supplies from UAE bases outside Libya directly in al-Kufra, rather than transporting them overland or by air from within other parts of Libya.   

The airport at al-Kufra plays a key operational role, serving as a logistical base to facilitate the flow of supplies to RSF forces through remote and lightly monitored corridors. Russia, as MEE has reported before, is most interested in securing a naval base at Port Sudan, with the government in Moscow building ties with the Burhan-led Sudanese administration now based in the Red Sea city. Wagner, the former Russian paramilitary group, left Sudan at the end of 2023, but ties between Moscow and Abu Dhabi remain strong.

Regional power plays

With Turkey recently stepping up its help for the Sudanese army and other regional powers, including Egypt and Saudi Arabia, aligned with Burhan, external actors continue to struggle for control and profit in Sudan, which still contains vast untapped natural resources and an expansive and strategically positioned coastline. The RSF has declared a parallel government in Nyala, South Darfur. This self-declared entity would border five countries, including South Sudan, Central African Republic, Chad, and now – following the capture of Sudan’s triangle border area – Libya and Egypt. 

“The new government will face many challenges to carry any civilian duties including the good governance, protecting the civilians and oversight the finance and this will lead to big failure which will threat the other neighbouring countries,” Suliman Baldo, the executive director of the Sudan Transparency and Policy Tracker, told MEE. “I don’t think it will be able to stop the smuggling of gold and crops from Sudan and maintain the other supplies coming from neighbouring countries towards Sudan as its big investments for the RSF commanders,” he said.

***

Mohammed Amin is a Sudanese journalist specialising in geopolitics and human rights abuses in Sudan and South Sudan, as well as elsewhere in northeast Africa.

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Hafed Al-Ghwell

Libya has since become a brutal case study in the consequences of institutional and governance collapse. The 2011 rebellion shattered Muammar Qaddafi’s hyper-centralized state but failed to replace it with a functional alternative. Instead, the international community’s fixation on centralized power-sharing deals with warlords and loose militia coalitions continues to neglect the crucial work of subnational institution-building.

Thirteen years of political limbo have not yielded a single coherent local governance framework, enabling parallel power structures to metastasize. To date, Libya remains split between the Tripoli-based, UN-recognized Government of National Unity and a rogue eastern fiefdom dominated by the warlord Khalifa Haftar and his sons. These, in turn, also compete with more than 100 autonomous militias, including tribal-affiliated groups exploiting administrative vacuums.

A conspicuous absence of well-defined, legally enforceable administrative boundaries is the principal accelerant. Law 59 of 2012 envisaged governorates as intermediaries between municipalities and the state, but zero have been operationalized. Proposed maps, like the Government of National Unity’s 2022 blueprint for 19 provinces, remain theoretical amid venomous disputes over territorial jurisdiction.

Meanwhile, tribal councils fill service-delivery voids in regions like Fezzan, where public structures have simply vanished. Elsewhere, municipalities consequently shoulder functions spanning healthcare, policing and infrastructure without budgets or coordination mechanisms, resulting in woeful outcomes such as crippled hospitals and extremely high dropout rates in schools. Such an operational vacuum is now fueling resource predation as local factions continue to seize parts of Libya’s petroleum sector. 

Tribal and militia leaders have also become adept at exploiting institutional ambiguity, converting geographic influence into lucrative monopolies. Illicit economies and networks are now generating sums close to one-tenth of Libya’s pre-2011 gross domestic product via ports and desert crossings administered by de facto warlords. At the same time, boundary disputes between Zintan and Gharyan municipalities have frozen $120 million in reconstruction funds for three years.

Such paralysis is not incidental; it is structural.

The persistent failure to establish legitimate subnational governance structures, particularly resolving the question of administrative boundaries, entrenches division and dims prospects for a unified, sovereign state. Delaying the resolution of this cartographic standoff means that Libya’s fragmentation risks becoming irreversible at the cost of more than 2 million Libyans who require humanitarian aid in a country that once boasted high life expectancy, literacy rates and per capita income.

There is some precedence to the depth of the challenge Libya faces now.

The country’s territorial administration has always been unstable, from the Ottoman sanjaks designed for tax extraction, to Italy’s colonial divisions, to King Idris’ short-lived federal experiment (1951-1963) balancing Cyrenaica, Tripolitania and Fezzan. Qaddafi’s 1969 coup replaced provinces with “people’s districts,” eviscerating local capacity. Post-Qaddafi, the 2012 Local Administration Law envisioned governorates, municipalities and sub-municipal tiers, yet the critical governorate level remains non-existent. This absence cripples coordination on regional transport, resource management and security, overburdening a weak central authority and leaving municipalities isolated.

Current proposals for administrative boundaries reveal crippling tensions. 

Advocates of three regions (Cyrenaica, Tripolitania, Fezzan) invoke historical legitimacy but ignore perilous realities. Similar “federalizations” around the world with minimal regional units, e.g. Bosnia (two entities), Comoros (three) and Pakistan (1973: four) all exhibit chronic instability. In addition, Nigeria’s post-independence shift from three to 36 states deliberately diluted ethnic domination. Libya’s three-region model risks entrenching the very divisions that fueled past civil strife: Fears of secessionism, resource-hoarding by dominant cities like Benghazi or Misrata, and the marginalization of smaller tribes within macro-regions. 

Alternative frameworks, for instance, 12 provinces or 13 units based on electoral districts, aim for balance but face legitimacy deficits. Electoral districts, drawn for technical convenience, often ignore deep-seated tribal animosities or socioeconomic ties. Proposals for “economic regions” coordinating multiple governorates require robust planning institutions and fiscal autonomy that Libya lacks. Crucially, all models stumble on the core political schism: Federalists demanding regional autonomy vs. centralists fearing state fracture. This deadlock paralyzes reforms while illicit economies flourish; fuel-smuggling alone generates at least half a billion annually for militias, entrenching rule-by-gun-barrel. 

However, there is still some hope yet.  

South Africa’s post-apartheid boundary delimitation offers curious parallels. Facing similar risks of ethnic polarization, it established a technocratic Commission on Demarcation and Delimitation guided by clear criteria: Historical boundaries, economic viability, infrastructure and cultural realities. 

Crucially, it embedded this within a Multi-Party Negotiating Forum, separating technical work from political bargaining. Four months of consultations yielded 780 written submissions and 157 oral testimonies, with hearings translated into 11 languages. The result: Nine provinces replacing apartheid’s racial Bantustans, validated through inclusive participation. 

Libya’s path demands a similarly structured process, not just a map. 

A boundary commission must integrate multidisciplinary expertise, such as demographers to quantify population distributions, economists to model resource allocation and geographers to assess topographical constraints, as seen with South Africa’s commission, which included 16 specialists across seven fields. Crucially, such a body must derive its mandate from an inclusive political forum representing Libya’s fragmented power centers, ensuring decisions reflect negotiated consensus rather than unilateral imposition. 

Historical continuities must be weighed alongside contemporary realities: Tribal land claims governing 65 percent of southern territories, hydrocarbon reserves concentrated in three basins and population disparities where Tripoli hosts 2 million residents while southern municipalities average 30,000. Resource distribution formulas must be codified to prevent rent-seeking, particularly given Libya’s lucrative oil revenues. 
Public consultations require robust methodologies, not tokenism. Besides, imposing boundaries without tribal and community buy-in guarantees rebellion. Yet Libya’s context demands added safeguards: Independent dispute-resolution mechanisms and explicit rejection of referendums, which magnify polarization in fractured societies. 

Lastly, dispute resolution necessitates permanent architecture. Nigeria’s National Boundary Commission, operational since 1987, offers a template: A neutral technical body empowered to adjudicate inter-provincial conflicts and manage cross-boundary resources. However, in Libya, where 40 percent of proposed boundaries overlap with militia territories, such a commission will require authority to deploy verification teams and impose binding arbitration, backed by international guarantors to prevent politicization. 

A tall order, given the current context, but the cost of inaction escalates daily. 

Libya’s chief export — oil, remains hostage to blockades by armed groups, even as 1.5 million people lack healthcare access, while municipalities, starved of funds and authority, cannot provide basic services. Each year of fragmentation deepens kleptocratic networks, radicalizes marginalized populations and erodes faith in public institutions. 

Strangely, the 2011 rebellion demanded dignity and equitable development. Redrawing administrative boundaries should therefore not be a mere cartography exercise but the very foundation for dismantling militias, redistributing resources and rebuilding social contracts. 

Without this, Libya’s sovereignty will remain a fiction sustained only by foreign patrons and kleptocrats.

***

Hafed Al-Ghwell is a senior fellow and program director at the Stimson Center and senior fellow at the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies. 

______________________

Gregory Holyoke

Family at home, friends abroad

Over the decades, Haftar had built up close relationships in Cairo, but when he returned to Libya, Egypt was also in the midst of revolutionary fervour, tending towards the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood group. As Gazzini explained, “There was a jihadist threat in Libya and then we have Egypt, which was very weak.”

“If you go back to before 2013 before (President Abdel Fattah) El-Sisi, there was this fear that Egypt could implode … And the Europeans also didn’t want Egypt to collapse,” she explained. Faced with difficult choices and fearing the likes of the self-proclaimed IS group spreading their influence in North Africa, some analysts believe that European leaders gave Haftar — whose power and army grew in strength — the silent nod of approval to do what he thinks is right.

“They needed a new Gaddafi, someone who could stop democracy from becoming contagious. Haftar fit the mould: ruthless, ambitious, and willing to trade sovereignty for support,” El Gomati believes. Egypt also backed him as a known known, someone in the immediate neighbourhood who understood the context, but also the perils the region was facing.

The list of backers, silent or otherwise, only continued to grow from there on out. In addition to Cairo, Haftar gained the support of governments ranging from Moscow to Washington, even though the UN did not recognise his wider authority as a legitimate head of state. However, according to Gazzini, it was Abu Dhabi and Paris who ended up as his most unquestioning supporters. While the Emirates saw the allure of Libya’s oil reserves — the largest in Africa — France and Europe more widely were dealing with an influx of refugees through the Mediterranean, hundreds of thousands of whom were hoping to reach the continent via Libya.

In all that, Haftar saw his chance to utilise the international support and finally become the ruler of Libya — and who knows, maybe even bigger than Gaddafi himself. When Haftar announced his intention to overthrow the Tripoli-based, internationally recognised Government of National Accord on the day UN Secretary General António Guterres arrived in the capital in 2019, even Egypt warned him against it.

“But he was full of hubris from the Emiratis who wanted to do it. They were giving him aerial cover. The French also wanted to do it,” Gazzini told Euronews from the IRG offices in Rome. It is a hubris that some have compared to his ally Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Yet similarly, Haftar’s attempts also failed. Tripoli refused to fall into Haftar’s troops’ hands, and Libya fell back into a form of stalemate.

Divided we stand

Throughout this time, Haftar was accumulating extraordinary wealth for his family, whom he had installed in various positions, experts say. As Eaton told Euronews, “There was a debate on whether when Khalifa (Haftar) died, could his sons come in and take over. It seems that they have come in and started creating their own portfolios even before.” And it is all in the family and the hands of his children, as El Gomati succinctly outlined.

“Saddam runs the ground forces. Khaled commands the personal guard. Belkacem controls the billions in Libya’s reconstruction fund. Sedig runs the reconciliation file,” he explained. The family has amassed a portfolio estimated to be worth billions. Despite his failure to seize the wider country, Haftar and his sons continue to run much of Libya. “He controls everything that matters in eastern Libya,” El Gomati said.

“Oil fields, ports, airports, military bases, and the central bank’s printing press. He has his own air force, controls cross-border smuggling routes… It operates like a state within a state.” As shown by the EU’s lack of retribution over the past week, the self-proclaimed field marshal also maintains significant international backing. He was recently in Russia for talks with Putin – a trip he was rumoured to have died on, but once again, he miraculously recovered.

The “humiliation” of the EU delegation also isn’t the first time Haftar has managed to push around supposed allies in Europe. The analysts Euronews spoke to put this down to Europe’s domestic wranglings over “irregular migrations,” and the simple fact that “there’s no way migrant boats would be leaving the east without Haftar knowing.”

Gazzini gave the example of her native Italy: “At some point, a lot of migrants were going to the coast of Italy about a year and a half ago, he let it be known that he wanted an official visit and an official invitation to Rome. And he got that.” At the end of his interview, El Gomati did not mince words about the European approach to the Libyan commander. “Europeans keep volunteering as victims. Haftar treats EU diplomats like desperate suitors because that’s exactly what they are.”

It is a point that Eaton also touches upon, albeit somewhat more diplomatically. “There’s a real imbalance,” he concluded. However, Europe is not acting in a vacuum either. It is often trying to play by international rules and conventions in an arena where shady actions speak much louder than words and agreements on paper.

Sometimes, it is better to have a strongman on your side — or at least his ear. “We have very little leverage compared to other states. Compare it with the Russians, who have MiGs and have fighter jets that are at Haftar’s disposal,” Gazzini admitted. “Compare us to the Emiratis who bring in reinforcements and ammunition in violation of the embargo.”

When a senior EU delegation travelled to the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi last Tuesday, they were hoping to discuss ways to limit the increasing numbers of migrants leaving Libya heading north to Europe. However, shortly after their jet touched down at Benghazi Airport, the cluster of EU foreign ministers – as well as European Commissioner for Migration Magnus Brunner – were sent packing.

There was no agreement, not even a meeting. They were unceremoniously kicked out and declared “personae non gratae,” a source on the European side told Euronews at the time, adding that the delegation was caught in a diplomatic “trap” in which Haftar tried to force them to take a photo with, and tacitly legitimise, his Benghazi-based government.

While the EU itself has been remiss to publicly comment on what one senior Libyan analyst said was outright “humiliation,” it is understood that the man they were hoping to strike a deal with was General Khalifa Haftar.When a senior EU delegation travelled to the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi last Tuesday, they were hoping to discuss ways to limit the increasing numbers of migrants leaving Libya heading north to Europe.

However, shortly after their jet touched down at Benghazi Airport, the cluster of EU foreign ministers – as well as European Commissioner for Migration Magnus Brunner – were sent packing. There was no agreement, not even a meeting. They were unceremoniously kicked out and declared “personae non gratae,” a source on the European side told Euronews at the time, adding that the delegation was caught in a diplomatic “trap” in which Haftar tried to force them to take a photo with, and tacitly legitimise, his Benghazi-based government.

While the EU itself has been remiss to publicly comment on what one senior Libyan analyst said was outright “humiliation,” it is understood that the man they were hoping to strike a deal with was General Khalifa Haftar.

________________________

Gregory Holyoke

After an EU delegation was humiliated by the commander in control of large swaths of eastern Libya, Euronews explores Haftar’s fall, then rise to power and who is helping him maintain it. When a senior EU delegation travelled to the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi last Tuesday, they were hoping to discuss ways to limit the increasing numbers of migrants leaving Libya heading north to Europe.

However, shortly after their jet touched down at Benghazi Airport, the cluster of EU foreign ministers – as well as European Commissioner for Migration Magnus Brunner – were sent packing. There was no agreement, not even a meeting. They were unceremoniously kicked out and declared “personae non gratae,” a source on the European side told Euronews at the time, adding that the delegation was caught in a diplomatic “trap” in which Haftar tried to force them to take a photo with, and tacitly legitimise, his Benghazi-based government.

While the EU itself has been remiss to publicly comment on what one senior Libyan analyst said was outright “humiliation,” it is understood that the man they were hoping to strike a deal with was General Khalifa Haftar.

As the head of the powerful Libyan National Army, despite not leading the internationally recognised government, Haftar has become the de facto ruler of vast swathes of the North African country, which has lacked a unified state since the fall and assassination of notorious dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

Although Haftar is arguably the most powerful person in Libya today, he was once persona non grata himself, living quietly in exile right up to Gaddafi’s demise.

Keep your friends close…

Born to an Arab Bedouin family in northeastern Libya at the start of Britain’s eight-year occupation of the country, Khalifa Belqasim Omar Haftar was, even according to his allies, “a very quiet young lad who did not do much work.”

However, he managed to gain admission to the Benghazi Military University Academy, where friends from his time there reportedly also refer to him as “a very stern boy”. “He would not ask for a fight, but if it came to him, he knew how to handle it,” Haftar’s friends described him. It was at the academy where Haftar got to know a student in the year above — one Muammar Gaddafi.

They became fast friends, with Haftar even labelling Gaddafi an “angel”. The two united over their revolutionary spirit, fomented by a recent political coup that toppled the monarchy and political class in Libya’s neighbour, Egypt. “We were massively affected by Jamal Abdel Nasser’s era and what was going on in Egypt,” Haftar later explained.

Haftar was also said to be a massive admirer of the Iraqi vice president at the time — soon to become another household name. “Khalifa’s most important son is named Saddam, who by the way is named after Saddam Hussein. He’s the most like his father, I think that tells you all you need to know,” Tim Eaton from the Chatham House Institute said during an interview with Euronews from London.

It is also likely that he chose his title, field marshal, as a nod to Yugoslav socialist leader Josip Broz Tito, experts believe. Just three years after his graduation, Haftar was instrumental in the 1969 coup, which toppled King Idris and replaced him with Gaddafi, who had expansionist ambitions of spreading his Islamic socialist ideology — also known as Jamahiriya — beyond Libya’s borders.

In subsequent years, Haftar trained in the Soviet Union and rose through the ranks of Gaddafi’s military, commanding the Libyan troops supporting Egyptian troops entering Israeli-occupied Sinai during the Yom Kippur War in 1973. This cemented what was to become an enduring relationship between the Libyan military commander and leaders in Cairo.

But keep your enemies closer

In 1986, Haftar was made a colonel before becoming the military chief of staff. As the Gaddafi regime became increasingly authoritarian and rogue, his rise seemed inexorable. However, his luck suddenly turned: Gaddafi’s favourite commander led a disastrous mission in the late 1980s into neighbouring Chad, which led to the capture of almost 700 Libyan soldiers, including Haftar himself.

He was jailed, along with his men. Then it was the US, not Libya, that secured his release, which Libyan analyst Anas El Gomati contends was a turning point in the Haftar-Gaddafi relationship. “Haftar was like Gaddafi’s chosen sword until he became his sharpest blade turned inward,” the founder of Libya’s self-described first think tank told Euronews.

As El Gomati explained, Haftar “was abandoned as a scapegoat, then spent two decades in Virginia plotting revenge.” “He didn’t just oppose Gaddafi, he became his dark mirror, learning every lesson about authoritarian control,” El Gomati pointed out.

In fact, Haftar spent the next 24 years in exile and working with Libyan opposition movements, living just kilometres away from Washington, in Langley, the home of the CIA. In 2019, a former advisor to Haftar in the mid-2010s, Mohamed Bouzier, concurred with El Gomati in an interview with the BBC. “He was inhabited by Gaddafi. He was inhabited by envy of Gaddafi. How Gaddafi ruled this country,” Bouzier said.

However, some Libya insiders privately told Euronews of rumours that Gaddafi had actually gifted his former military chief an opulent mansion in Cairo during this time — the same house in which Haftar’s most powerful son, Saddam, grew up.

Back in the fold

When protests erupted across the Arab world in 2011, Libyans took to the streets in cities across the country. After decades of discussing plots to overthrow Gaddafi with willing Western ears and, as Libya expert Claudia Gazzini describes it, “sort of defecting to the Americans”, Haftar finally saw cracks emerging and soon went to the Libyan capital Tripoli.

However, the International Crisis Group’s senior analyst pushed back on the idea that Haftar was a key US puppet in the Libyan revolution. “I haven’t heard anybody make it so explicit. It would make sense, but nobody has said the Americans told him to go back there,” Gazzini said. Even if they did, it would not have been a short-term success, she continued.

“In 2012-2013, he based himself in Tripoli, but he wasn’t a big name at the time, because there were just so many different armed groups in Tripoli an the power was balanced out between all these people.” El Gomati was less diplomatic: “Haftar was a footnote, a Cold War fossil.”

It was not until 2014 that Haftar’s head really appeared above the parapet, when he announced an operation which he said was to root out extremists in Benghazi. Even then, Gazzini contends that he was not taken seriously. “It was very pathetic. He actually came on TV with a big map behind him saying: ‘Hey, you know, we need to rebel against these bad Islamists.’”

A claim that both Gazzini and Eaton doubt, with the latter telling Euronews that “for Haftar, there’s always been good Islamists and bad Islamists.” “There’s actually a lot of Salafists (Islamist extremists) in his ranks, just ones who can take orders,” Eaton explained.

However, Operation Dignity, as it was known, helped consolidate Haftar’s power over Libya’s second biggest city and much of the country’s east. Over the following years, he built up his power and became the supreme commander of the Libyan National Army in 2015.

None of this happened in a vacuum.

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Julia Fengler

Since 2020, Libya has recorded the largest improvements in the Global Peace Index. However, ongoing challenges, fragmented governance, foreign interference, and institutional weaknesses, continue to undermine stability, explains Julia Fengler.

After nearly a decade of civil war, Libya in the past few years has substantially reduced its levels of open conflict. However, this relative peace belies its extreme social fragility and fractured military and political landscape, which leaves it at heightened risk of renewed conflict. 

After nearly a decade of civil conflict that followed the 2011 overthrow of long-time ruler Muammar Ghaddafi, Libya has recently experienced a notable improvement in peacefulness. Since 2020, it has registered the largest improvement of any country in the Global Peace Index (GPI), improving by 25 places in the global rankings.  

Yet Libya’s progress in reducing outward manifestations of violence belies the country’s extreme social fragility amid its deeply fractured military and political landscape. This fragility is reflected in Libya’s ongoing deteriorations in Positive Peace, IEP’s measure of social and institutional resilience. While Libya’s recent reductions in violence are welcome, they have come as the result of an untenable socio-political stalemate. Unless Libya’s fractures can be overcome and its institutional resilience can be strengthened, peace will remain unsustainable, as shown in the outbreaks of violence earlier this year.

Historical context  

Libya’s present-day instability is deeply rooted in the legacy of Gaddafi’s four-decade rule. Coming to power in 1969 through a military coup, Gaddafi established an authoritarian regime that dismantled formal institutions. His jamāhīriyyah system replaced traditional government structures with a complex network of people’s committees and revolutionary councils. Political dissent was harshly repressed, and opposition groups were exiled. While Gaddafi used oil wealth to fund social programs and infrastructure, his rule left Libya without functioning political institutions or a clear succession plan.  

In the context of the Arab Spring, civil war broke out in the country in 2011, causing tens of thousands of deaths and leading to the regime’s collapse. This created a major power vacuum, in which militias, tribes and rival political factions competed for control.  

Without strong institutions or a unified national army, Libya struggled to transition to democratic governance. Elections in 2012 initially brought hope, but growing tensions between Islamist and secular factions, along with the rise of powerful militias, led to renewed violence. This fragmentation triggered a second civil war in 2014, with frequent clashes and the involvement of external actors costing thousands more Libyan lives.  

After six years of intensive fighting, this second civil war ended through a ceasefire agreement in 2020. These successive conflicts of the 2010s, combined with a substantial upsurge in terrorist activity, drove the massive deterioration in the country’s peace score, and their cessation has driven its subsequent improvement.

The records of the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, for example, count around 4,000 deaths from internal conflict in 2011. And from 2012 to the end of the decade, the country averaged more than 1,100 conflict fatalities per year, but it has recorded fewer than 15 conflict deaths each year since 2021.  Similarly, according to the Global Terrorism Index 2025, terrorism peaked in Libya in the mid-2010s. There was a high of 234 terrorism-related deaths in the country in 2015. But there have been no recorded terrorist attacks or deaths since 2022.

Contemporary challenges 

While negative peace, defined as the absence of violence or fear of violence, has recently improved in Libya, this trend has not been accompanied by corresponding gains in Positive Peace. Positive Peace encompasses the social systems, institutions and governance structures that support long-term stability. By this metric, Libya has been on a largely consistent deteriorating trajectory for more than a decade. As of 2024, it ranks 145th out of the 163 countries in the Positive Peace Index (PPI).

Libya’s dearth of Positive Peace has been reflected in, and exacerbated by, the country’s fractured political landscape. In recent years, it has effectively been ruled by two governments, each controlling a large portion of its territory. The internationally recognised Government of National Unity (GNU) is based in Tripoli and controls the western part of the country, while a rival authority backed by Commander Khalifa Haftar controls Benghazi and the eastern part of the country.  

Both factions claim legitimacy, but neither has been able to carry out the long-promised national elections, originally scheduled for December 2021. This stalemate has frozen reform efforts and left much of the country in a state of political uncertainty. Unless meaningful steps toward unity are taken, this persistent fragmentation of governance will leave the country vulnerable to renewed eruption of violence.  

In early May 2025, for example, Tripoli experienced its most severe outbreak of violence in over a year, following the assassination of Abdel Ghani al-Kikli, a commander affiliated with the Government of National Unity. His death triggered armed clashes between government-affiliated forces and non-state actors. The violence quickly escalated in densely populated neighbourhoods, resulting in the deaths of both combatants and civilians. Although a UN-brokered ceasefire was reached by mid-May, the incident revealed the fragile nature of Libya’s security landscape.

Future prospects 

Since that ceasefire, militia mobilisations have continued, particularly around Tripoli. These movements have prompted the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) to issue repeated warnings, most recently in July. While the overall conflict intensity has declined, the risk of future violence remains high. 

Foreign involvement has further complicated this picture. Türkiye backs the GNU, while Russia, through proxies and private military contractors, supports Haftar’s forces. Though these powers may bring temporary stability to certain regions, they also obstruct national reconciliation.  

Libya’s post-2011 trajectory reflects the gap between the absence of war and the presence of peace. While the country has moved beyond the peak of open conflict, the underlying drivers of instability – fragmented governance, foreign interference, and institutional collapse – remain in place. As a result, gains in peacefulness may prove temporary without deeper structural reforms and a resolution to the political and military deadlock.

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Chiara-Lou Parriaud and Grace Spalding-Fecher

JUST SECURITY

France’s Dangerous Game in Libya

In his dealings with the Libyan regime, Sarkozy strayed away from the more restrained foreign policy approach of his predecessor, Jacques Chirac (1995-2007), and instead pursued a more assertive stance.

This shift culminated in the French- and British-led NATO intervention that toppled Gaddafi in 2011. Yet France’s interventionist legacy did not end with Sarkozy’s defeat in the 2012 presidential election.

His successors, François Hollande (2012-2017) and Emmanuel Macron (2017-present), despite their criticism of the NATO operation, have continued to meddle in Libya’s political process at the expense of Libyans’ fundamental freedoms.

Since 2011, France has officially backed the U.N. Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), supporting efforts to hold free elections, rebuild public institutions, and prevent armed conflict.

Yet as the U.N.-brokered Libyan Political Agreement in December 2015 was leading to the formation of the GNA, France’s domestic priorities shifted as the country was hit by multiple Islamist terrorist attacks in its capital.

The national security crisis reinforced the Middle East strategy of then-Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, under former President Hollande, who prioritized a security approach in Libya at the expense of democratic considerations.

Le Drian saw a pragmatic ally in Haftar, especially because of his victories against ISIS and al-Qaeda. For France’s counterterrorism operations in the Sahel region, Haftar appeared capable of imposing order and stability in a fragmented Libya that had become a haven for jihadist groups.

The Libyan Political Agreement called for broad inclusion of Libyan factions in the political process and civilian oversight of the military. In contrast to these terms, France began quietly bolstering Haftar’s eastern regime.

Since early 2015, it provided support via special forces, advisers, and clandestine operations. The death of three French secret service agents in a helicopter crash near Benghazi in 2016 forced Hollande to confirm France’s military presence in the country.

France’s meddling and double standards in Libyan political affairs became more blatant under Macron, who hosted Haftar and the GNA’s then-Prime Minister Fayez al‑Sarraj for peace talks in July 2017, circumventing the established U.N. peacebuilding efforts.

Though both pledged support for a ceasefire and prompt national elections, Macron’s move – making him the first European leader to host Haftar – granted the warlord international legitimacy, despite EU, NATO, and U.N. support for the rival GNA.

Although professing support for the Libyan Political Agreement, Macron failed to include other factions in the talks and made no demands on Haftar.

In May 2018, Macron continued to sideline the U.N.-led process by convening Haftar and Sarraj along with Libyan parliamentary leaders, where he proposed a plan to hold elections by December 10, a timeline widely seen as unrealistic at the time.

Macron’s unilateral initiative only incentivized the U.N. plan’s detractors to stall negotiations. After this plan fell apart, U.N. special envoy Ghassan Salamé postponed elections till spring 2019, but Haftar derailed the process by launching an offensive on Tripoli.

In response to the offensive, France leveraged diplomatic protection to thwart the EU from condemning Haftar, downplayed the humanitarian toll, and portrayed the warlord’s opponents as terrorists.

On the ground, U.N.-backed forces found four American-made Javelin anti-tank missiles, supplied by France, in a Haftar-controlled stronghold south of Tripoli. Meanwhile, France’s Emirati allies hired Russian mercenaries, cementing a long-term Russian presence in Libya. Through the end of 2019, Haftar’s forces made fast territorial advances until Turkey sent troops to bolster opposing GNA forces, prompting the GNA to declare a unilateral ceasefire in October 2020.

Going Beyond Counterterrorism

Paris’ adulation of the Libyan war general goes beyond counterterrorism; it is also rooted in its strategic alliances with key military partners across the wider Middle East, primarily Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, both major buyers of French weapons and backers of Haftar’s LNA.

The warlord also enjoys support from Russia, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, while the GNU is backed by Turkey and Qatar. Marginalizing Haftar could jeopardize lucrative military contracts with Egypt and the UAE, two of France’s most important clients.

Although the Franco-Emirati relationship has deteriorated since 2021, Sisi and Macron’s ties remain strong.

Natural resources also dictate France’s presence in Libya, as the French energy company Total holds exploration rights in several oilfields in the West and a share of one of Libya’s main oil companies.

Furthermore, as Ali Albayaa, a research fellow specializing in the Middle East and North Africa region at the Human Rights Foundation, told us, “We should not overlook Macron’s personal ambitions of projecting France as a guarantor of European continental security.”

Libya is a crucial piece in France’s puzzle, as Haftar controls the majority of the country’s territory and, by extension, the masses of immigrants pouring into France in search of a safer future.

Haftar’s capacity to shape immigration realities in Europe partly explains France’s tacit support to the dictator.

The Costs of French Realpolitik

Not only does France’s diplomatic and military support for Haftar delegitimize the U.N. political process, but it also abets the perpetuation of human rights abuses by Haftar’s LNA.

In fact, Haftar himself was convicted by a U.S. judge in 2022 of war crimes for his role in ordering extrajudicial killings and torture in Libya. The militias that make up the LNA are no better and have been accused of a host of human rights abuses.

The Tareq Bin Zeyad Brigade (TBZ), led by Haftar’s son Saddam, has been accused of crushing any opposition to the LNA. Amnesty International has documented the TBZ’s links to a “catalog of horrors,” particularly against migrants, including torture, mistreatment, and forced expulsions in total impunity.

Haftar’s 2019 offensive on Tripoli, which France tirelessly sought to shield from international condemnation, was marred by significant human casualties, killing at least 430 civilians and displacing 250,000 more.

Rampant corruption and mismanagement further infringe on the local populations’ fundamental freedoms. One example is the collapse of two dams in September 2023 in the city of Derna after a storm brought heavy rains to the country’s northeastern coast. The resulting devastation killed at least 4,000 people and left tens of thousands of people missing to this day. Corruption within both the GNU and the LNA is to blame for the floods’ cataclysmic impact.

The dams collapsed after over a decade of warnings about their degrading state and a half-hearted attempt to fix them by Libyan politicians on both sides. The widespread protests that erupted following the disaster were met with the eastern regime’s brutal retaliation and arbitrary arrests of activists.

Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst on Libya security and associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies, pointed out to us that these authoritarian tactics are not unique to the Eastern regime; in fact, the GNU in the West has adopted more totalitarian actions in recent months, with little objection from the international community.

France’s Pervasive Legacy

“What started out as military aid in the context of France’s fight against terrorism ended with Haftar managing to transform that technical aid into political and ideological support,” Harchaoui explained in an interview. “Once Haftar gained absolute control of Benghazi from ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Libyan political opponents in 2017, France should have ended its support.

Instead, under Macron’s presidency, it continued to support Haftar diplomatically.” Harchaoui concluded, “It’s in the name of realpolitik that France lacked realism in Libya.

By solely backing Haftar, France left key players out of its unilateral vision for the country’s future. As a result, France does not hold the same relevance that it did in 2019. Libya has turned into a playing field for non-Western powers.”

Despite its waning influence, the damage France has done will persist. The Libyan civil and political spaces are rife with human rights violations, as both regimes deploy authoritarian practices to repress any form of dissent and political pluralism.

Libya’s window of opportunity for nationwide elections, which briefly opened in 2021, is not available today due to the partisan nature of foreign interference that has sown divisions rather than the unity sought by the U.N.-led political process. France needs to bear responsibility for the long-term consequences of foreign interference.

With the Sarkozy-Gaddafi trial, French democracy upholds its commitment to holding its former leaders accountable for their wrongdoings. France owes this self-healing, in large part, to its civil society.

Without the Médiapart journalists who first uncovered the affair, or anti-corruption organizations like Sherpa, Transparency International, and Anticor, which coalesced as civil parties in the trial “to underscore the systemic mechanisms facilitating financial flows and the associated repercussions on the populations of impacted states,” and without the French Association of Victims of Terrorism (AfVT), which also joined as a civil party to represent the families of the DC10-UTA flight victims, France’s judiciary would not have had the tools to address the complex web of corruption weaved by Sarkozy, Gaddafi, and their respective ministers.

If Libyans are to have a real chance at democracy, France must stop undermining the U.N.-led peace process by legitimizing warlords through backchannel diplomacy. Instead, it should hold perpetrators of violence in both Libyan regimes accountable for their human rights abuses through individualized and targeted sanctions.

On the commercial front, any lucrative contract passed between France and its Middle East allies should be conditioned on the respect of human rights.

Repression should not be rewarded. And at the grassroots level, in light of civil society’s vital role in democratic processes – as witnessed during the Sarkozy trial – France should support and fund civil society efforts in Libya to ensure diverse voices are included in a viable political solution.

Although Libyan civil society organizations, such as Together We Build It, are working to address the absence of women’s participation in peace-building processes, foreign powers should also empower an intergenerational, gendered approach to peace-building. It is only by pushing for accountability, transparency, and letting Libyan voices be heard that France will truly play a constructive role in ensuring Libyans’ access to their fundamental freedoms.

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