The deadlock in Libya continues.
Over the past few years, international diplomatic efforts have failed to stop the fighting between the Government of National Accord (GNA) led by Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj in Tripoli and the forces supporting General Khalifa Haftar in the east of the country.
Today, foreign interventions are mostly those of Turkey in the west, supporting the GNA, and Russia, which supports Haftar and has drawn a line in the sand in the country’s center to stop the GNA’s advance. Egypt, another supporter of Haftar, has stated its willingness to defend its interests but hasn’t sent troops on Libyan soil.
Russia’s support to Haftar is not new. It is part of a multipronged strategy in the Mediterranean basin aimed at reinforcing its military footprint, investing in energy resources, and being politically present in the EU’s neighborhood.
It involves using private military forces, such as the Wagner Group and Syrian militias, but also dispatching air force assets from its Hmeimim base in Syria, a stepping-stone facility conceived for the entire Middle East and North Africa—not just for the Syrian war.
Turkey’s military presence stems from multiple motivations and follows a November 2019 double deal with the GNA redefining the Turkish-Libyan maritime borders in the Eastern Mediterranean and putting in place a security cooperation agreement.
In geopolitical terms, this deal can be seen as a unilateral step taken by Ankara at a time when the GNA and its capital, Tripoli, were under extreme pressure from Haftar’s troops. Turkey’s military actions have rescued the GNA with substantial military supplies—including armed drones and short-range missiles—advisers, and Syrian militias. This operation, comparable to Russia rescuing the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from the brink of collapse in September 2015, is meant to bring tangible benefits to Ankara.
Irrespective of these recent developments, Libya still matters immensely for Europe.
With its 1,800-kilometer Mediterranean coastline and 4,000-kilometer land borders with Algeria, Chad, Egypt, Niger, Sudan, and Tunisia, Libya represents a huge land mass. It has traditionally hosted many European and American oil and gas operators as well as solid business interests, especially Italian (a gas pipeline runs between Melittah and Sicily).
During Colonel Muammar Qaddafi’s rule, well-equipped human trafficking networks were channeling irregular migrants from western and central Africa to the western Libyan coast and onward to Italy. On and off, Qaddafi used these networks to pressure Italy and the EU. Trafficking never stopped during the Libyan civil war, which began in 2011, and could increase massively at any time, depending on the political control—firm or loose—exerted on the traffickers.
A major novelty in the past few months has been the transfer by Russia and Turkey of several thousand jihadists from the Syrian Idlib province to Libya to be used as proxy fighters on both sides of the conflict. Even if peace is established in the future in Libya, these fighters could become a vector of terrorist activity against Europe, Algeria, Egypt, Tunisia, or the Sahel countries. In all cases, European and American security interests would be endangered.
A permanent use of air and naval bases in Libya by both Russia and Turkey would be a major game changer for Western Europe’s security and would have implications for NATO and the United States as well.
The al-Watiya air base, Misrata’s port, and Sirte—which has a port as well as Libya’s largest air base—are all located more or less halfway between Syria and Gibraltar and a mere 600–700 kilometers south of the Italian Sigonella air base in Sicily, which hosts several U.S. activities related to Southeastern Europe and the Mediterranean.
Despite such major stakes, most commentators see the European Union as marginalized, impotent, and disunited in its approach to Libya.
Indeed, the Lisbon Treaty’s first decade resulted in modest EU foreign policy achievements, whether in Ukraine (Crimea and Donbas), Iran, or Syria. Foreign affairs policymaking was moved to the level of the European Council, while a few states—especially the largest ones—have often acted on their own.
Questions abound: Confronted with such major stakes, will EU leaders wake up and decide to act jointly as the European Union, or will they be satisfied to leave Libya’s future in the hands of Russia and Turkey? Will the lessons of Russia’s annexation of Crimea or military footprint in Syria since 2015 be learned? Will it be considered innocuous for Europe’s security if Turkey undertakes a permanent military operation in Libya along the lines of its Syrian operations?
Will Russia and Turkey’s combined challenge to EU interests be ignored?
In case the EU wakes up, European leaders can immediately take three steps:
- Hold a comprehensive debate on Turkey’s activities in Libya at the special EU foreign ministers’ meeting convened on July 13, 2020. This should be an EU debate, not just France, Germany, or Italy trying to convince their colleagues to follow their lead. It should result in a strong statement on the EU’s policy to stop the hostilities and foreign interventions in Libya and bring about a peace settlement. Ideally, it should also begin to tackle the other pending issues between the EU and Turkey.
- Launch a summer-long diplomatic campaign to consult with Libyan stakeholders, UN Secretary General António Guterres, the UK, the United States, and NATO, as well as Egypt, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates on the security situation in Libya.
- Prepare a second Berlin conference where debates would begin where the January 2020 Berlin conference left off, including its subsidiary meetings.
The three-pronged EU institutional leadership (European Council President Charles Michel, European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen, and High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell) should be at the center of this process, as a means to guarantee that EU interests are fully considered and that the EU toolbox is used in a comprehensive manner—including military, economic, trade, and financial tools; assistance to refugees; border protection; sanctions; and linkage with other issues in the Eastern Mediterranean.
These ideas may sound like old-fashioned wishful thinking. Yet, Libyan stakeholders and third parties may be inclined to listen more intently to an EU-wide position than to discordant voices from Berlin, Paris, and Rome.
A strong EU initiative on Libya could underpin German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s third priority for the German EU presidency: strengthening Europe’s ability to act beyond its borders. And not before time.
Comments(6)
A veiled call by the author, Marc Pierini, for European neo-colonialist involvement yet again in North Africa. This was tried jointly with NATO in 2011 and the result has been nine years of ongoing bloodshed and bedlam after Libya was supposedly "rescued from Gaddafi". But was this something unexpected? Not if one remembers the 1830 French conquest of Algeria which lasted for 132 years or France's reign of terror in Tunisia from 1881 until 1956 for 75 years; or the 1911 Italian colonization of Libya. As the philosopher George Santayana famously stated, "Those who cannot remember the past (even for nine years, back to 2011) are condemned to repeat it".
Did the UN recognized government of Libya invite Turkey to defend themselves against war criminal and torturer LNA? Yes. Does France support war crimes of LNA? Yes. So how exactly is Turkey is the problem here, and how exactly Turkish support for democratic Libya threatens Europe? I thought you all liked democracy or do you like democracies only when it helps you control weaker nations? See, this is why no one buys your crap anymore. The thinly painted humanism and democratic values you put on your face is coming off quickly, and people recognizing you for the hypocrites that you are. You have always been imperialists, racists and colonialists. We see nothing has changed since the WWII. Susan Sontag was right, you are indeed the cancer of the human race.
Is the Libyan government elected? No. Is the Libyan Parliament elected ? Yes. Where does the government fighters come from? Syria. Who are they? Terrorists. Will Egypt stand idle? No.
"In case the EU wakes up, European leaders can immediately take three steps: Hold a comprehensive debate on Turkey’s activities in Libya" So, just ignore the fact that Russia AND UAE propegated this war and spearheaded the operations/coup de ta against an internationally recognized government, and blame Türkiye who stood by a legitimate government to help them defend their rights? By which logic do perceive that Russia will stop doing what they want, they annexed Crimea and the EU did nothing, do you really believe that they will not thwart any EU plans or try to subvert them. Keep on blaming Turkey, until you wake up to another Russian czar knocking on your door!
I don't understand that even EU could not have concensus within itself how can EU intervene the problem. What is the meaning of UN recognized government in respect to international law. Last question is how can EU would change Russian support to Haftar forces even France together with her?
At least Turkey has picked a side here whether its the wrong one time will tell, the EU just dithers France has tried but has no concrete backing, Germany is all talk and finger waving tut tut! Italy can afford to do nothing along with Greece. This is a mess that the EU has any solution to, as they don't have the tools to deal with this. Turkey may have picked the other side from the EU but if they are not going to spring into economic or military action to try and sort this the EU should leave it to Turkey and Russia to sort. Shut the doors to Libya if they don't like the winner and close a few to Turkey and Russia, US, Britain, Canada and Norway are staying well out of this one, who can blame them its for the southern Europeans to sort out its there neighbourhood. Nothing changes inaction from EU as usual.
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