A senior United Nations executive used a speech in January 2018 to push for the country to hold credible elections this year in a bid to ensure a peaceful shift from a failed unity deal. Under Secretary General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman acknowledged that “credible elections will require an understanding in terms of political agreements” as well as new legislation and the necessary security conditions across the conflict-wracked nation”. But he insisted the UN wanted “to do our part in promoting the political, the security, the technical and the legislative condition to see that the Libyan people’s desire for these elections can be realised this year”. A 2015 UN-brokered deal that saw the establishment of Fayez al-Sarraj’s Government of National Accord was meant to calm years of chaos that followed the ousting of dictator Moamer Gaddafi in 2011. But Libya has remained mired in violent turmoil as the country is riven by divisions between the western-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli and a rival administration backed by military strongman Khalifa Haftar in the east. The GNA has struggled to maintain unity after former members of the General National Council (GNC) attempted a coup against the UN-sponsored coalition. An attempted putsch in October 2016 saw armed units backed by trucks mounted with anti-aircraft guns seize buildings of the UN-backed GNA around Tripoli’s Rixos hotel complex, with local forces fleeing without a fight. The GNA was intended to unify the country’s fighting forces, but it is based on support mainly from militias in the west of the country. Western countries had hoped that a united government would bring an end to the chaos in the country since the fall of Gaddafi in 2011 that has allowed Islamic State (IS) militants to establish a base in the North African country.