Will a British drafted resolution kick mercenaries out of Libya?

Indiana Khaled

The United Kingdom has initiated a proposal to the UN Security Council on Feb. 1 on the withdrawal of mercenaries from Libya. The British proposal and the Berlin conference on Libya raise a number of questions about the outlook of the Libyan situation.

Kamel Abdalla, a political analyst at the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, expects that the British proposal would be mere ink on paper, citing that Russia will reject it.

Abdalla noted that the United States and France have not revealed their stance on the proposal yet. “The two countries have interests in Libya. Britain is seeking to withdraw mercenaries from Libya. Britain initiated the same proposal in April 2019, and the proposal did not see light,” Abdalla told THE REFERENCE.

“There have been many Security Council resolutions issued since 2011, and all of them have not been carried out,” he said, adding that countries like Russia, France, United States and Turkey have military bases in Libya, and they have contributed to creating militias in Tripoli.

The political analyst noted that the Berlin conference on Libya had failed before it started on Jan. 19, citing that most the countries that took part have their own plans about Libya.

UN’s top Libya envoy Ghassan Salame said on Jan. 30 that there are foreign fighters in Libya without unveiling their nationality.

Some international reports said Turkey had sent 2,600 fighters to Libya 48 hours after the Berlin conference on Libya wrapped up.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a report released on January 19 fighters who want to go to Tripoli are being registered. In this regard, the London-based Arab newspaper said mercenaries from Syria to Libya were transported via the Libyan and African airlines passing through Turkey. Then the flights fly back to Istanbul without passengers.