The Libyan government has agreed to give its backing to a UN-led mediation attempt aimed at brokering a deal with Misuratan militias that have installed a parallel administration in Tripoli.
Late talks involving Libyan Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni agreed to give the UN special envoy to Libya, Bernardino Leon, a number of weeks to try to pave the way for peace talks, sources told The Sunday Times of Malta.
Mr Leon emerged from late-night talks that also involved members of the Libyan Cabinet, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and Foreign Affairs Minister George Vella, saying that he was satisfied that there was a “mood change” on the Libyan side.
A diplomatic source told this newspaper that the plan is to convince the Misuratans that they are better off pulling out of Operation Dawn “and there is real hope that this is now possible, more than it was only a few months ago”.
Operation Dawn is a disparate coalition of Islamist groups that rejected the general election results in July and joined forces to push the government out of Tripoli and the second city Benghazi, forcing the elected Parliament and the administration to operate from Tobruk.
They range from affiliates of the relatively moderate Muslim Brotherhood to Ansar al-Sharia, an Islamist militia aligned to al-Qaeda, which advocates the introduction of sharia law across Libya.
Misuratans may accept they’re better off brokering a deal
“But this coalition is facing pressures, both military and, more importantly financial, I think there is an understanding that the Misuratans might be brought round to the idea that they are better off brokering a deal with the Libyan government,” the source said.
The Libyan delegation used the Malta visit – the first of its kind by any foreign State involving the Prime Minister and almost half his Cabinet – to drum up its profile with the EU, which was following closely through its embassies.
Another pull factor has been the US Ambassador to Libya Deborah Jones who has been holding meetings in Malta with a number of key Libyan politicians.
On Tuesday, shortly after the Libyan delegation landed, the Turkish envoy to Libya, Emrullah Isler, landed and joined the group in a meeting with the US Ambassador.
The development comes as fighting escalated, particularly in the east, where the military group of General Khalifa Hiftar, which supports the Libyan government, mounted a counter-offensive against Ansar al-Sharia.
Meanwhile, reports surfaced yesterday that a training aircraft from Misurata’s Air Academy had been used for the first time in the barrel-bomb attack against the runway of Zintan’s civilian airport.