In Paris in late July, a long-anticipated meeting between the head of Libya’s ruling executive and the leader of one of the country’s main armed groups finally took place. Under the precociously avuncular eye of French President Emmanuel Macron, the prime minister in Libya’s Presidency Council (PC), Fayiz Serraj, reached a deal with the head of the Libyan National Army (LNA), Khalifa Haftar. The two men agreed to a 10-point plan that includes a ceasefire, a commitment to the political resolution of Libya’s problems, and a deal to work towards parliamentary and presidential elections.
But there have been deals in the past that have failed to bring an end to a three-year battle between the many sides of a state that is perhaps irreparably fractured. Most notable among them was the Libyan Political Agreement (LPA) of December 2015. In recent months, the economy has begun to benefit from the strides made to increase oil production to more than 1mn b/d (MEES, 4 August). But the political and security situation remains both fragile and volatile. The LPA itself has frequently been accused of adding a third ‘government’ to an already divided country, and it has done little to rid itself of such criticism. (CONTINUED - 1164 WORDS)
