Foreign fighters continue to flood Libya while the UN remains silent

The ceasefire agreement was called a victory by the GNA, Haftar’s forces and the international community, a cause for celebration after over a year of bloodshed in the offensive waged by Haftar’s forces on the country’s capital.

A key element in the military agreement between both parties was the withdrawal of all and any military foreign forces in Libya from both sides of the conflict as well as withdrawal of local forces from areas they have seized.

A period of time was set for the departure of foreign military forces infringing on Libyan grounds, the maximum of that period was three months in which all local military units return to their camps and all foreign and mercenary fighters depart Libya from all fronts.

Two of the three months have gone by and thousands of mercenary fighters remain on Libyan grounds, with suspected more being brought in in clear violation of the ceasefire agreement by Haftar’s forces.

Stephanie Williams in a recent speech emphasised the importance of respecting the ceasefire agreement and stressing the danger foreign military forces pose to the Libyan sovereignty.

She also said that there now more than 10 military bases in the country which are almost entirely run by foreign forces and estimating that there 20,000 foreign mercenary forces in Libya.

Williams warned Libyans everywhere that these foreign actors are not in Libya for your interests, they are in Libya for their interests.

The UNSMIL’s primary focus is on the Libyan Political Dialogue forum has to lead to the mission’s glaring silent to the violations taking places on the ground to the ceasefire agreement and the threatening presence of foreign mercenary forces in Libya, despite committing to foreseeing the implementation of the agreement.

With Haftar mobilising his forces and blatantly violating the agreement with unprovoked attacks on GNA forces, Libya’s UN recognized government has threatened on more than one occasion to withdraw from the ceasefire agreement, leaving the fragile state of peace in the country hanging by a mere thread.