Month: February 2017

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres met the head of the Libyan Presidency Council, Faiez Serraj, at the Human Rights meeting in Geneva yesterday.  Guterres said the UN would continue to do all it could to further Libyan attempts to find a political compromise after Serraj admitted Libya was guilty of the torture of unarmed civilians.  See pages 262 to 277 of Belfast to Benghazi for more on the UN and Human Rights abuses in Libya.

https://www.waterstones.com/book/belfast-to-benghazi/rupert-wieloch/9781861515667

Ben Farmer in the Daily Telegraph reports the Defence Secretary’s tardy warning to Putin about Libya, but Russia stayed in Tripoli when the West withdrew.  This photograph shows the foreign military advisors with the Chief of the Armed Forces after the revolution, including the Russian and Ukraine contingents.  See Belfast to Benghazi page 279 for more missed opportunities.  www.amazon.co.uk/Belfast-Benghazi-Untold-Challenges-War/dp/1861515669

In a BBC interview this afternoon, Laura Maxwell asked me about the most intriguing North Atlantic Council meeting since 9/11.  The US Security relationship with Russia is the most antagonistic since the Cold War at the same time that the US President has the best relationship with the Russian President in living memory.  This irony has the potential to cloud decision-making at a time when the West needs clarity.  If NATO splits, there will only be one winner…

After attacking EU proposals to send migrants back to Libya, Martin Kobler is to be replaced as UN Special Representative of the Secretary General by US-educated, former Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.  He will have his work cut out trying to implement a Libyan Political Agreement that is widely seen as broken and unimplementable.  More help needed…

For UN missed opportunities in Libya, see page 262 of Belfast to Benghazi: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Belfast-Benghazi-Untold-Challenges-War/dp/1861515669