(Adnkronos) – Italy’s foreign minister Antonio Tajani is “worried” at the fragile truce between rival armed groups in oil-rich Libya, which still has rival governments in Tripoli and in the east, 15 years after the ousting of late dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
“I am worried by what is happening in Libya,” Tajani told reporters in The Hague on the sidelines of a Nato summit on Wednesday.
“We must tackle the Libya question because it is of great importance for us Italians,” Tajani said.
Libya stands at a new critical juncture in its prolonged political transition, after armed clashes erupted in Tripoli in May, further destabilising the country, UN envoy Hanna Tetteh told the Security Council on Tuesday.
The outbreak of fighting in Tripoli last month temporarily disrupted UN development and humanitarian operations and caused civilian deaths and injuries amid emerging evidence of grave human rights violations, allegedly by state security forces, with the discovery of mass graves in Abu Slim, Tetteh stated. The fighting also damaged critical civilian infrastructure, she said.
The truce which halted the armed clashes on 14 May “remains fragile, and the overall security situation unpredictable,” Tetteh told the UN Security Council.
Tetteh urged Libya’s rival factions to forge consensus on a forthcoming UN roadmap to end Libya’s transitional period with the election of a democratic, progressive government.
Italy has extensive economic interests in its former colony Libya’s energy and other sectors and has sealed agreements with Tripoli aimed at stemming migrant boat crossings to Europe from its shores.
