“The fight isn't
over until you win.”
― Robin
Hobb, Royal Assassin
Indeed. However,
in Libya, both sides believe they have won, and the fight is still not
over. General Khalifa Hifter launched a military offensive against the
Government of National Accord (GNA) in April 2019, employing the rhetoric of
freedom and empowerment of the people against neo-imperialist interests
invested in the incumbent government. Everyone understands the
fallaciousness of these claims, and that the fight is only but one for the
control of oil, considering that Libya has the largest oil reserves in Africa.
Its land has long become a battleground for proxy wars that stretch across the
European, Asian and African continents, whilst the USA is observing with much
weary as it sees Russian influence slowly, but surely, extending to the
southern Mediterranean.
Meanwhile, the
Libyans are still at war. Lives are lost, security is shattered, the economy is
struggling, and the society is polarized.
What is it that
Hafter wants? And what is it that the GNA refuses to cede? The moment the GNA
forces recaptured the entire city of Tripoli, oil production resumed
in the Sharara oilfield in the south. When Turkey struck two major
agreements with GNA in November 2019, the energy competition in the Eastern
Mediterranean and the Libyan crisis entered new phases. The Libyan civil war
can only be summed up as an international competition over oil reserves. Full
stop. Not a war over security, or ideology, or democracy. It is about oil.
Libya’s state
National Oil Corporation (NOC) recently announced that oil exports were
down by 92.3 per cent since the country’s oil blockade. As a result, Libya’s
cumulative losses from the current oil blockade have neared $5 billion.
Such reporting is the norm when it comes to the civil war in Libya. Gains and
losses are quantified, usually in oil terms. Little do we hear about the
people, the environment, or the losses inflicted on the society.
International
powers supporting either side are concerned for their own economic and
geo-strategic interests. Whether it is to land cheap oil contracts, or allow
maritime privileges, the forces backing Hafter and GNA are openly, blatantly,
and sassily professing their ulterior goal.
The UN support
mission in Libya said the fighting over Tripoli "has proven, beyond any
doubt, that any war among Libyans is a losing war." It urged both sides to
"engage swiftly and constructively" in UN-brokered talks aimed at
reaching a lasting cease-fire agreement. How will that be possible if it is in
no one’s interest to allow national conciliation?
The way things
are going, it seems that only two solutions are possible: splitting the country
in the middle, with Hafter controlling one part and the GNA the other, and
subsequently slicing both parts up like one of these pizzas in which each slice
has a different topping (analogy evident here). I was wrong; there is no second
solution.
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