The Lackluster Peace Talks in Libya

The fall of Muammar Kaddafi has hurled Libya into the chaos of a three-years-long struggle between liberal forces supported by the army and Islamist parties propped up by former rebels. Five successive governments have fruitlessly been trying to establish control over a country that is de facto split into three parts (Cyrenaica in the east, Tripolitania in the west and Fezzan in the south), and with most of the territory still held by various Islamist groups.

The fall of Muammar Kaddafi has hurled Libya into the chaos of a three-years-long struggle between liberal forces supported by the army and Islamist parties propped up by former rebels. Five successive governments have fruitlessly been trying to establish control over a country that is de facto split into three parts (Cyrenaica in the east, Tripolitania in the west and Fezzan in the south), and with most of the territory still held by various Islamist groups.

The situation has been exacerbated by the parliamentary elections last June where the Islamic forces suffered a defeat. Although turnout was abysmally low and the ballot in pro-Islamist regions was totally disrupted, the international community has not hesitated to recognize the elections as unquestionably legitimate. Unwilling to give up, the Islamists captured Tripoli, Libya's capital, and set up an alternative government, supposedly in order to defend the revolution and prevent return of Mr. Kaddafi's bureaucrats. Afterwards, the elected deputies had to flee to the port of Tobruk, 1,600 kilometers from Tripoli.

As a result, the Libya of today is a diarchy shared by the Tobruk-based parliament elected by the popular vote and led by Prime Minister Abdullah Abdurrahman al-Tani on the one side, and the delegitimized pro-Islamic General National Congress and its Prime Minister Omar al-Hasi, on the other.

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The Impact of Libya’s Crisis

Along with muddled governance, Libya is still plagued by violence. Troops led by former Libyan army general Khalifa Haftar are battling against other groups, including the Ansar ash-Sharia movement, which is attached to al-Qaeda and associated with the attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi.

In brief, this is the environment in which the United Nations is trying to sponsor peace talks, the round one of which was held in late September in Gadames between members of the elected parliament – twelve deputies recognizing the body and twelve boycotting its sessions. According to U.N. Special Representative on Libya Bernardino Leon, the first gathering has brought two decisions, a launch of a political process to solve the government matters and issue a political appeal for a ceasefire.

The outcomes appear to have encouraged the UN to promote the negotiations, although a breakthrough during the next set of rounds is unlikely and the appeal for a political dialogue to restore stability in the near future comes off as rather utopian.

As a matter of fact, Libya is facing a host of intractable problems, the primary of which are its destroyed statehood and a lack of civilized tools for fixing the situation. The talks are terribly complicated by the fragmentation of the parties after the overthrow of Mr. Kaddafi and the existence of over 1,500 armed groups of Mr. Kaddafi's followers, radical Islamists, and local tribes of assorted traits, who have been warring against each other for the last years. They definitely seem to be too numerous to concede to a truce in the absence of appropriate dividends.

And it is the Islamists who remain the only political force able to run the government if the elected parliament and government fail to receive international support.

Reuters
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
speaks during a meeting in Tripoli urging the
warring factions fighting for control of Libya
to make peace

One more challenge lies in the self-disassociation of the Western community. Instead of assisting the elected Libyan authorities in the establishment of the new government and the improvement of the security environment, the United States, Great Britain, Germany, France and Italy have publicly declared their readiness to use UN Security Council Resolution 2174 and sanction those "who threaten the peace, stability or security of Libya or obstruct or undermine the political process" [1]. At the same time, the five governments also agree that there is no military path to a Libyan settlement. The West sees a way to rescue Libya through a peaceful political dialogue under the auspices of its House of Representatives, i.e. its national parliament, elected on last June 25. Hence, it is the sanctions rather than the physical destruction that threaten the Islamists.

The peace talks conundrum has been graphically highlighted by the unannounced trip of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who came to Tripoli in mid-October to meet those parliament members boycotting the UN-sponsored negotiations. With due respect to the United Nations Organization, its efforts are not nearly sufficient to pacify Libya. Drastic changes appear likely only if the Western community chooses to somewhat shift its focus from the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq and Russia-Ukraine relations to Libya.

1. According to UN Security Council Resolution 217 on Libya dated August 27, 2014, international sanctions may be triggered by the violation of human rights and international humanitarian law; attacks on transportation junctions, government institutions and foreign missions; and the violation of the embargo on arms supplies to Libya.