Ghadames meeting: Signs of Libyan crisis easing

Hossam al-Haddad

The United Nations Support Mission in Libya on Saturday, October 31 revealed that the 5+5 Joint Libyan Military Committee was meeting for the first time in the city of Ghadames, southwest of Tripoli, from November 2-4. This is the fifth joint military meeting, although the previous four meetings were held outside Libya.

According to the UN Mission, the participants in the meeting will discuss the implementation of the permanent ceasefire agreement, and it is expected that the parties will also address the issue of establishing sub-committees, in addition to monitoring and verification mechanisms for the lull.

A few days ago, the United Nations announced that the 5+5 Joint Libyan Military Committee had signed an agreement in Geneva for a permanent ceasefire in Libya.

The Mission stated that the fifth round comes “after the signing of the permanent ceasefire agreement in Geneva,” noting that the talks will be attended by Acting Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General in Libya Stephanie Williams.

This meeting precedes the political dialogue talks that the United Nations invited 75 Libyan personalities to participate in, which starts on November 9 in Tunis, with the aim of discussing the formation of a unified and consensual authority.

This authority is supposed to manage a transitional period in Libya, pending the holding of parliamentary and presidential elections.

These developments coincide with the retreat of Tripoli-based Government of National Accord head Fayez al-Sarraj from his resignation at the end of October as scheduled, under the pretext of calls for him to stay for a temporary period.

In this context, Sarraj agreed with Williams that the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum “is a historic opportunity for the Libyans to decide to move towards a political solution away from any foreign interference.”

Accordingly, the two sides stressed the need for the political solution to include all Libyans.

Libya has been witnessing chaos and violence since the fall of the Muammar Gaddafi regime in 2011 in protests supported militarily by NATO.