On Monday, a UN-led effort to help Libya’s warring camps achieve an agreement on a constitutional framework for elections failed once more, leaving the country’s political dilemma unsolvable.
Representatives from the parliament in eastern Libya and the High State Council (HSC), who met in Cairo under the auspices of the United Nations from June 12 to 19, were unable to reach an agreement on the text that will govern the presidential and legislative elections, which were originally scheduled for late 2021.
“The third and last round of negotiations on the Libyan constitutional track between the House of Representatives and the HCE finished in the early hours of June 20,” UN Special Adviser on Libya Stephanie Williams of the United States said on Twitter.
“Differences persist on measures controlling the transitional period leading up to the elections,” she admitted, despite the fact that the “joint committee obtained wide accord on disputed provisions of the proposed Libyan Constitution.”
Ms Williams praised members of both chambers for their attempts to “resolve their disagreements on a variety of hard topics,” saying Libyans, who number roughly 3 million, “deserve nothing less from (their) political leaders.”
Ms Williams, in her capacity as Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General on Libya, urged the two houses’ presidents to “meet within ten days to resolve the outstanding concerns.”
Because of the very deep disagreements between political competitors and ground tensions, holding presidential and parliamentary elections at a predictable date, which have been postponed indefinitely until December 2021, appears highly unlikely.
Since March, two governments have been vying for control. The one in Tripoli, which was established at the start of 2021 under UN supervision to oversee the transition until elections and a government formed in March with parliament’s endorsement.
