This is a rich country, but they can't agree on who should run it.
Just two posts away I said:
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There is relatively little reporting on Libya....
This AM John Simpson, the BBC's Chief Foreign Correspondent, was on the radio from Tripoli:
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The main airport has been destroyed, all the main embassies have been closed down, the big international hotels all stand empty. There are long and frequent power cuts. And yet Tripoli appears entirely calm.
It is quiet because the city has been carved up by two rival warlords, and their forces are so finely balanced that it is not in the interests of either of them to attack the other. And directly you look below the surface, you start to find the problems that afflict people here.
No TV footage yet:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-33673034
The new Libya: various aspects
‘Confronting ISIS in Libya: The Case for an Expeditionary Counterinsurgency’
A SWJ article which includes a review of recent history regarding the civil war / insurgency, plus a few maps. A good read too.
2011 a taxi driver; 2015 an oil minister
Catching up, a three week old article from The Spectator, by a journalist who went there. With the title and sub-title:
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Cameron’s talking to the wrong Libyan government. He should call my old driverThere are real reasons to worry about Libya Dawn – but also real reasons to try to work with them
Link:http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/...my-old-driver/
Near the end:
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It’s not the first time the West has walked away from a land they supposedly liberated, leaving a mess, I pointed out. At some point, Libya will have to sort out its problems on its own.
IS Foothold in Libya Threatens Europe, West Africa
IS Foothold in Libya Threatens Europe, West Africa
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Libya and the Failure to Learn From Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria
Libya and the Failure to Learn From Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria
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Pentagon: U.S. Forces in Libya, Looking for ‘Worthy’ Partners
Pentagon: U.S. Forces in Libya, Looking for ‘Worthy’ Partners
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March to Folly 2.0: The Next Western Military Intervention in Libya
From ECFR by a recommended Italian SME (via Twitter) and starts with:
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Those who want to bring the western war against the Islamic State to Libya insist, as a US official put it in a private conversation, that any intervention would be about IS not about Libya. Alas, regardless of what it will be about, it will take place in Libya. That simple geographic reality means the complex political feuds and intrigues that have plagued Libya politics for the last five years will inevitably intrude on any Western intervention. Ultimately, a Western intervention that fails to account for Libyan politics and fails to consider what will replace ISIS in the event it is defeated will have no benefit for Libya or for the West.
Link:http://www.ecfr.eu/article/commentar...vention_in5083
Link to ECFR author's bio:http://www.ecfr.eu/profile/C238
British 'advisers' deployed to Libya to build anti-Isil cells
A story in The Daily Telegraph (UK) credited to a reporter in Washington DC, cannot think why. It starts with:
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Britain has discreetly deployed military advisers to Libya in order to build an army to fight Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant cells in the country...Special forces commandos are said to be working alongside their US counterparts in the city of Misrata to stop the jihadists’ progress in the lawless terrain across the sea from Italy.
Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...sil-cells.html
The Libya Gamble Part 1: Hillary Clinton, "Smart Power" and a Dictator's Fall
The Libya Gamble Part 1: Hillary Clinton, "Smart Power" and a Dictator's Fall
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