Insight
The EU and US must work together to end the siege of Tripoli by Luigi Scazzieri 30 January 2020
The conflict in Libya is spiralling out of control despite the recent Berlin conference. Europeans need to work with the US to pressure regional powers to stop fuelling fighting. The recent escalation of Libya’s civil war has seen Europeans scrambling to regain the initiative. Following the 2011 NATO campaign led by France and the UK that removed Colonel Muammar Gaddafi from power, member-states tried but failed to stabilise Libya, and the country has been embroiled in civil strife since mid-2014. The conflict escalated as actors ranging from the UAE and Egypt to Russia and Turkey have become increasingly involved, while European efforts to broker peace have been incoherent and ineffective. The conflict now risks triggering a new wave of refugees and leading to a revival of the Islamic State. The latest phase of the conflict began in early April 2019, when military commander Khalifa Haftar, whose power base is in eastern Libya, launched an offensive on Tripoli in an effort to unseat the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) led by Fayez al-Sarraj. Europe had helped to set up the GNA in late 2015. The siege, which started while the UN Envoy to Libya Ghassan Salamé was in Tripoli, has killed hundreds of civilians and displaced 140,000. Initially, the assault did not appear to be making headway, but in late 2019 Haftar made important gains, thanks to increased air support from the UAE and the assistance of hundreds of mercenaries from the Wagner group, a private security company linked to the Russian government. The GNA sought international assistance to defend itself, but was spurned by European countries and the US, both of which called for a halt to the fighting but took no further action to halt Haftar’s offensive. The GNA then turned to Turkey for help – and in exchange for a controversial maritime agreement, Ankara began providing assistance in January, largely in the form of around 2,000 Syrian mercenaries. The GNA’s maritime boundary demarcation agreement with Ankara has infuriated many EU member-states, in particular Greece, as it includes parts of its designated Exclusive Economic Zone. Seemingly stunned by the growing Russian and Turkish influence on its doorstep, Europeans sought to regain the initiative in Libya. Following an unsuccessful joint Turkish and Russian attempt to negotiate CER INSIGHT: The EU and US must work together to end the siege of Tripoli 30 January 2020
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