Libya’s UN-backed govt moves to secure Tripoli’s main airport
TRIPOLI: A force operating under Libya’s UN-brokered government said on Thursday it was securing Tripoli’s main airport, which has been closed since it was badly damaged in fighting in 2014 and which was controlled by a rival faction until last week.
The Presidential Guard formed by the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) was able to access Tripoli International Airport after loosely aligned armed groups gained ground in heavy fighting in the capital last Friday.
The GNA has struggled to impose its authority since arriving in Tripoli in March last year and to rein in militias that still hold sway on the ground. It has been rejected by factions in eastern Libya loyal to powerful military commander Khalifa Haftar.
The capture of the airport shows a gradual extension of the power of armed groups in Tripoli that have at least tolerated the GNA’s presence.
The airport, which lies about 25 km south of central Tripoli, had been controlled by armed groups loyal to a previous, self-declared government.
On Thursday, a passenger jet swooped low over the airport in an effort to demonstrate to journalists gathered there that it was secured.
In a separate development, France’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday security conditions were still not right to reopen its embassy in Libya despite a claim by the prime minister of a UN-backed government there that Paris wanted to restore its diplomatic mission soon.
France closed its embassy in Tripoli in 2014 amid growing instability in the North African country, but Fayez Al-Seraj, the head of the Government of National Accord (GNA), said in a statement on May 30 that new President Emmanuel Macron had promised him to reopen the embassy “as early as possible.”
“Our embassy for Libya is currently located in Tunis. We would like that it reopens in Tripoli as soon as security conditions are right,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Romain Nadal told a daily news briefing, adding that the current French envoy was making regular trips to Libya.