The government is keeping its options open on whether to send troops on the mission once a decision has been taken to activate it.
Last week, all member states gave the green light for the creation of EUFOR Libya. The mission can only be deployed on the UN’s request but in the meantime, under the command of Italy , its headquarters have been established in Rome and the details of a possible intervention are being prepared.
It is not clear what the mission will be doing. However, one of its objectives is to be in a position to use military vessels to pull out and evacuate Libyans and sub-Saharan Africans from Libyan ports if the civil war continues to escalate.
Asked about the level of support Malta was prepared to get involved in, a government spokesman confirmed the island had already seconded an AFM officer to form part of the Operation Headquarters and other options are actively being considered.
“ Malta is considering a possible future contribution, which will need to be determined in line with the requirements of the operation once the exact tasks are established,” the spokesman said.
According to the EU’s mandate, once Operation Headquarters has completed the initial planning phase and the EU Council approves these plans, member states will be invited to contribute to the component that can be deployed once the UN submits its request.
It is not yet known whether the UN will make such a request and so far it seems there is no real need for the mission to be deployed as the humanitarian situation appears to be under control.
European Commission spokesman Michael Mann said the EU was just preparing the background and the details of a possible intervention, “ but there are no real concrete plans on when this mission will be deployed”.
“ We just wanted to prepare ourselves so that the EU can intervene if a UN request is made. At this stage we don’t even know if the UN will make a request,” he said.
Asked whether, if put into place, this mission might see more migrants being ferried to Malta, the closest EU member state to Libya, the Commission’s spokesman said this should not be the case. However, he did not say where possible future evacuees would be transferred in such an eventuality. On its part, the government downplayed this possibility.
A government spokesman said although the EU’s humanitarian operation may be requested to contribute to the safe movement and evacuation of displaced persons from North Africa, the main focus was to support humanitarian organisations if the situation in Libya deteriorated.
“ This means that evacuation of any third country nationals by this mission will be to a place of safety in a third country ( non-EU country) rather than the EU,” the spokesman said.