November 21st, 2018 | 0 commentsWith overt enthusiasm, Libyans openly celebrated Prophet Mohamed’s birthday (the Mawlid al-Nabawi or Miloud) this year, reinvigorating life into an old traditional practice recently prosecuted, silenced and perceived as un-Islamic by some Islamic interpretations. The Sufi turuqs (orders) have been an integral part and in the forefront of...
October 17th, 2018 | 0 commentsLibya’s High State Council (HSC) voted on Monday its preconditional approval of the House of Representatives’ (HoR) proposal to restructure the Presidential Council (PC). The HSC agreed to the main thrust of the HoR’s proposal that the PC be reduced to only three members consisting of a head with two deputies. However, the HSC amendments...
October 9th, 2018 | 0 commentsLibya’s militia problem is worse than the militia problems of Lebanon, Ghassan Salame, the head of UNSMIL has said. Speaking to the London-based Al-Hayat Arabic-language newspaper, Salame said that Libya has 200,000 militia-members that the Libyan state has been providing some kind of (legal and financial) cover for – over the last five y...
October 9th, 2018 | 0 commentsLibya’s UN-backed Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj changed the interior minister and reshuffled other cabinet posts on Sunday in a move seen as a bid to broaden his support nationwide and bolster security in the capital after weeks of clashes, Reuters reports. Tripoli has been hit by fighting between rival armed groups competing over access...
September 25th, 2018 | 0 commentsFrance on Monday called for stronger UN sanctions on Libyans who stand in the way of a political solution in the conflict-ridden country. The current situation “forces us to show greater firmness toward those who want to insist on the status quo for their sole benefit,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told reporters at the Unit...
September 11th, 2018 | 0 commentsUNSMIL, the United Nations Special Mission in Libya, published the details of the “Ceasefire Consolidation Agreement” signed on 4 September in Zawia between the militia factions fighting in the south of Tripoli over the last two weeks. Here is the full text of the UNSMIL statement: The Ceasefire Consolidation Agreement Based on the 4 Sept...
September 11th, 2018 | 0 commentsThe House of Representatives has postponed today’s session to “the end of the week or to next week”. The HoR failed to attract enough members to Tobruk with many being distracted by the events in Tripoli as well facing logistical problems due to the closure of Tripoli’s Mitiga airport. It will be recalled that this was going to be yet ano...
September 3rd, 2018 | 0 commentsThe quick early advances into the capital Tripoli achieved by Tarhuna’s 7thInfantry ‘‘Kaniat’’ Brigade (led by the Kani brothers) over the last week seem to have slowed down as fighting continued today. A missile fell on the old Tawergha IDP camp in the Fellah area of Tripoli reportedly killing one person and injuring a number of others....
August 29th, 2018 | 0 commentsLibya’s House of Representatives (HoR), Libya’s internationally recognized parliament, failed to muster a quorum for yesterday’s session, which it needed in order to vote-in the constitutional amendment needed to legalise its referendum bill. The referendum bill was agreed in principle at the HoR’s last session before the Eid holidays – s...
August 20th, 2018 | 0 commentsFaiez Serraj, the head of Libya’s internationally-recognized Presidential Council and Government of National Accord (PC/GNA), met Wednesday at his Tripoli headquarters with both the head of the High State Council (HSC), Khaled al-Mishri, and the Governor of the Tripoli-based Central Bank of Libya, Saddek El-Kaber. The PC/GNA Media Office...
