World powers gathered Wednesday in Berlin to seek enduring peace in Libya by ensuring the conflict-wracked North African country doesn’t deviate from its plans to conduct general elections on December 24.
Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah of Libya’s interim government joined US Secretary of State Antony Blinken as well as the foreign ministers of France, Turkey, and Egypt at the UN-sponsored talks.
Russia’s Sergei Lavrov was absent, but deputy foreign minister Sergey Vershinin was attending in his place.
The efforts to end a decade-long spiral of violence in Libya are the second round held in Berlin, after the first attended by the presidents of Turkey, Russia, and France in January 2020, before the pandemic.
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Africa Daily News, New York reports that before heading into talks, Blinken renewed demands that all foreign forces leave the war-battered nation.
A ceasefire agreement from October last year “has to be fully implemented including by withdrawing all foreign forces,” Blinken told reporters ahead of the conference opening.
Dbeibah also joined in the call saying he and his team were in “Berlin as representatives of a national unity government that carry the hopes and aspirations of the Libyans who want to see a unified and stable country”.
‘We refuse a return to war,’ he said, adding however that the presence of foreign fighters remained a source of instability.
Participants at the 2020 conference had agreed to put an end to international meddling and for foreign militants or troops to withdraw.
However, neither Moscow nor Ankara, both of which have significant forces in the country, have met their promise.
The United Nations has estimated that 20,000 foreign fighters and mercenaries are still on Libyan territory. And that presence is seen as a threat to the UN-backed transition leading to the elections.
AFRICA DAILY NEWS, NEW YORK
