UN-led Libya talks enter final day

TUNIS — A week of UN-led talks on Libya were set to conclude on Sunday, the latest phase in renewed efforts to end a decade of conflict in the North African country.

The political talks in neighbouring Tunisia bring together 75 delegates selected by the UN to represent a broad range of constituencies, but observers have criticised the way they were chosen and cast doubts over their clout in a country where two administrations are already vying for power.

The UN said on Friday that the delegates had agreed to hold national elections on December 24 next year, without specifying whether these would be presidential, parliamentary or both.

The Tunisia talks were also meant to produce a temporary executive to govern in the interim, providing services to a country battered by economic woes and the coronavirus pandemic as well as the conflict.

The meetings came in parallel with military talks earlier in the week to fill in the deals of an October ceasefire deal that formally ended over a year of fighting between forces backing rival administrations.

The UN's former envoy to Libya and the architect of the current UN process, Ghassan Salame, told AFP on Friday he had higher hopes than ever for peace, citing "an accumulation of positive factors".

But observers remain wary, noting the numerous previous deals that have failed to bring an end to the war.

Libya has been riven by conflict since the 2011 NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed veteran dictator Muammar Qadhafi, with an array of militias filling the vacuum and civilian bodies struggling to impose their authority.

Today two rival adminstrations are vying for control of the country — a unity government in Tripoli that emerged from previous UN-led talks in 2015 — and an eastern-based House of Representatives elected the previous year, which never recognised the unity government.

In 2019, HoR-allied commander Khalifa Haftar, who was backed by Russia and the United Arab Emirates, launched an offensive to seize Tripoli.

But after a year of bloody stalemate on the edges of Tripoli his forces were repelled by pro-unity government forces boosted by Turkish military support.

That led to a formal ceasefire deal in October.

Elected Libyan officials called on Saturday for a constitution to be approved before national elections are held, without challenging the date of the polls.