Enforce arms embargo on Libya: UN

Council calls for political talks

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 16, (AP): The UN Security Council adopted a resolution Tuesday demanding that all countries enforce the widely violated UN arms embargo on Libya, withdraw all mercenaries from the North African nation.

The council also called for political talks and a cease-fire in the war, stressing it has no military solution. The vote was 13-0, with Russia and China abstaining.

In the years after the 2011 uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Muammar Gaddafi, Libya has sunk further into turmoil and is now divided between two rival administrations, based in the country’s east and west, with an array of fighters and militias – backed by various foreign powers – allied with each side.

The resolution’s approval follows a recent report by UN experts monitoring sanctions on Libya that accused its warring parties and their international backers – the United Arab Emirates, Russia and Jordan on one side and Turkey and Qatar on the other – of violating the arms embargo, saying it remains “totally ineffective.”

The resolution also extended UN’s political mission in Libya, or UNSMIL, until next September and stressed its “central role in facilitating a Libyan-led and Libyan-owned inclusive political process and in achieving a lasting ceasefire.”

The job of former UN special representative Ghassan Salame, who resigned in March, has been split into two, as the United States demanded, putting a special envoy in charge of UNSMIL to focus on mediating with Libyan and international parties to end the conflict, with a coordinator in charge of day-today operations.

The US demand held up a replacement for Salame and the resolution asks Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to appoint a special envoy “without delay.”

Tensions in oil-rich Libya escalated further when east-based forces, under commander Khalifa Hifter, launched an offensive in April 2019 trying to capture the capital, Tripoli.

But Hifter’s campaign collapsed in June when militias backing the U.N.supported government in Tripoli, with Turkish support, gained the upper hand, driving his forces from the outskirts of the capital and other western towns.