RFI | Brazzaville summit on Libya Libya Herald A summit on Libya is to take place tomorrow, Friday, in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, with a number of African heads of state expected to attend. UN special envoy Martin Kobler flew in yesterday and has been holding talks ahead of the meeting with ... Congo to host mini AU summit on Libyan crisis |
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Brazzaville summit on Libya - Libya Herald
Libyan businessmen and governmental officials are in London today seeking investment in the countrys key industries.
The Libya Reconstruction and Investment Forum is being held at Lancaster House, a government-owned mansion in St Jamess operated by the Foreign Office.
Oil, healthcare and infrastructure will be among the sectors where Libyans will be looking for foreign investment today at the meeting hosted by Middle East Association and Developing Markets Associates
British Ambassador in Libya, Peter Millett said: we are very pleased to have helped with organising this forum, which is an important step towards reinvigorating the Libyan economy.
Investment in electricity, water, and healthcare is critical to alleviating the suffering of the Libyan people. After five years of violence and political divisions, the Libyan people deserve better.
Mustafa Sanallah, chairman of Libyas state-run oil firm, told delegates at Chatham House this week that the country would be opening up its oil reserves to foreign investment following a five-year moratorium.
Sanallah is hopeful that agreements with militias to allow oil to leave via the countrys major oil ports will give Libya a chance to boost its output to the global market, roughly 40 per cent of which is currently lost to smuggling.
While the UN-backed Government of National Accord, based in the west of the country has the sole right to export Libyas oil under international law, major oil ports and number of oil fields in the east of Libya are still controlled by the rival Tobruk-based government.
Libyas oil output is currently at a 3-year high and is expected to be pumping 1.25m barrels a day by the end of 2017. The country had been producing 1.6m barrels a day prior to the toppling of Moammar Gaddafi in 2011.
Chinese and South Korean firms have already expressed interest in investing billions of dollars into crucial oil infrastructure, according to Sanallah, who will be meeting some of these companies in London today.
Despite having concerns that a "legitimate government with a mandate from the people to come to power", Sanallah is confident that with further investment we can use oil to unify the country.
We cannot stand back and do nothing while the state disintegrates Sanallah told delegates at Chatham House this week. The engagement of the firms represented at Lancaster House today may prove crucial in achieving his vision.
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Londoners invited to invest in Libya - City A.M.
In this Friday Jan. 13, 2017 photo, Idris 3, from Mali, center, sleeps next to his mother Aicha Keita, right, on the deck of the Golfo Azzurro vessel after being rescued from the Mediterranean sea, about 20 miles north of Ra's Tajura, Libya. Spain's maritime rescue service says the bodies of seven African migrants have been found dead along the Strait of Gibraltar since Friday. (AP Photo/Olmo Calvo) (The Associated Press)
BRUSSELS The European Commission is urging European leaders to endorse sweeping measures to help stop tens of thousands of desperate people from leaving Libya in search of better lives in Europe.
The commission said in documents published Tuesday that the leaders should "deploy the full range of EU missions and projects" to help Libyans manage their borders and protect migrants.
Conflict-torn Libya is a main departure point for African migrants trying to reach Europe via Italy. More than 181,000 people attempted the dangerous central Mediterranean crossing last year. About 4,500 died or disappeared.
European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said in a statement that "too many people are still dying in the Mediterranean."
He said: "First and foremost, stability in Libya and the region as a whole is required."
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EU leaders urged to back migrant measures for Libya - Fox News
Emirati Man Held on Spying Charges in Libya Found Dead Benson County Farmers Press A Libyan spokesman says an Emirati national detained since 2015 on spying charges has been found dead after militiamen stormed the detention center where he was being held and killed him. Sadik al-Sour of the public prosecution office told The ... |
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Emirati Man Held on Spying Charges in Libya Found Dead - Benson County Farmers Press
Migrants rescued in the Mediterranean north of Libya. The number risking the sea crossing climbed to a record 181,000 in 2016, up from 154,000 the previous year. Photograph: Olmo Calvo/AP
The European commission has rejected proposals to offer Libya a deal similar to the EUs agreement with Turkey on migration, revealing divisions over how to respond to the record death toll in the central Mediterranean.
The EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, outlined her opposition to the suggestions as she set out plans to boost EU training for the Libyan coastguard, arguing that the situations were completely different.
The commissions stance is a setback for the Maltese prime minister, Joseph Muscat, whose island state took over the rotating presidency of the EU on 1 January, with the goal of healing Europes divisions on migration.
Malta is preparing to welcome EU leaders, including Theresa May, to a summit next week aimed at taking urgent action to reduce deadly sea crossings from north Africa to Italy. Speaking in the European parliament last week, Muscat warned that unless the essence of the Turkey deal is replicated in the central Mediterranean, Europe will face a major migration crisis.
EU leaders struck a grand bargain with Turkey in March 2016, which offered money for Syrian refugees and visa-free travel for Turkish citizens in exchange for a crackdown on people smugglers operating from the country. EU officials believe the deal has been the main factor behind the dramatic reduction in arrivals to Greece. Fewer than 50 people a day have arrived on Greek shores in recent weeks, compared with 1,900 a day one year ago.
In contrast, the number of people risking the sea crossing across the central Mediterranean to Italy has continued to rise, climbing to a record 181,000 arrivals in 2016, up from 154,000 the previous year. More than 90% of those migrants embark from Libya. The death toll has also hit a new record: more than 5,000 people lost their lives in the Mediterranean in 2016.
Commission officials are, however, wary of making a Turkish-style economic bargain with Libya, highlighting the instability and conflict that has plagued the country since the overthrow of dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
Turkey and Libya also have very different ties to the EU. The EU has been pursuing increasingly fruitless membership talks with Turkey for more than a decade, but Brussels wants to play peacemaker in Libya, where civil war is at risk of reigniting.
Migrants travelling to Europe via Turkey tend to be Syrians, Afghans and Iraqis fleeing war, whereas those arriving from Libya are more often leaving repressive regimes, instability and poverty across north and sub-Saharan Africa.
Mogherini, a former Italian foreign minister, said: The two situations are completely different, the two countries, the migrants are completely different, the composition of the [migrant] flow is completely different, the measures are completely different, there is no comparison that can be done.
She announced 200m (170m) in EU funding aimed at stopping migration across the central Mediterranean between the EU and Libya. This includes 3.2m to expand the EUs training programme for the Libyan coastguard.
Some of the money will be used to step up a programme of voluntary returns to help people stranded in Libya return to their country of origin. Up to 1 million migrants live in Libya, drawn from neighbouring Egypt, Niger and Sudan, and sometimes as far away as Syria and Bangladesh, according to the International Organisation for Migration. The commission wants to expand an IOM programme to return migrants from Libya to their home countries.
At the EU summit in Valletta EU leaders will be asked to consider whether the EUs anti-smuggling naval unit, Operation Sophia, should patrol Libyan territorial waters.
The latest plans were unveiled as the commission announced a three-month extension of temporary border controls in continental Europes border-free travel zone. The Schengen zone covers 26 countries, including non-EU Switzerland and Norway, but not the UK.
Austria, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway were given the green light to maintain border checks, which were hastily introduced as large numbers of refugees and migrants arrived in Europe in 2015.
Dimitris Avramopoulos, the European commissioner for migration, described the controls as exceptional measures for an exceptional situation and said he hoped to return to a border-free zone in continental Europe as soon as possible. Under EU law temporary border controls can be reinstated for a maximum of two years.
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Migration: EU rejects proposals for Turkey-style deal for Libya - The Guardian