{"id":27002,"date":"2016-07-18T02:47:59","date_gmt":"2016-07-18T02:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/libya-prime-minister-designate-urges-unity-for\/"},"modified":"2016-07-18T02:47:28","modified_gmt":"2016-07-18T02:47:28","slug":"libya-prime-minister-designate-urges-unity-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/libya-prime-minister-designate-urges-unity-for\/","title":{"rendered":"Libya prime minister-designate urges unity for fractured country"},"content":{"rendered":"

{UN envoy Martin Kobler said that General Khalifa Haftar has repeatedly refused meetings to discuss disunity of Libya’s military forces.}<\/p>\n

The head of Libya’s unity government on Sunday urged his countrymen to close ranks to overcome political divisions in a nation already wracked by the threat of militants.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister-designate Fayez al-Sarraj spoke to reporters after a day of UN-hosted talks focused on creating a “unified” army in the oil-rich North African country.<\/p>\n

The United Nations late last year brokered a power-sharing deal to form a Government of National Accord (GNA), but the Sarraj government is still struggling to assert its authority.<\/p>\n

“We call again on all the children of the country who have not yet joined us to place the nation’s interests before any other consideration,” Sarraj said in Tunis.<\/p>\n

On Saturday, the head of the UN’s support mission in Libya, Martin Kobler, said that “all Libya’s problems today are tied up to the security issue”.<\/p>\n

Speaking after the talks in the Tunisian capital, Kobler said the goal of the meeting was to create “a unified Libyan army under the command of the presidential council”. <\/p>\n

“Libya cannot be united as long as it has several armies,” he said, according to an Arabic translation of his remarks.<\/p>\n

The meeting also touched on humanitarian issues.<\/p>\n

The GNA faces a fearsome set of military, economic and political challenges in a country where rival militias have vied for power since the overthrow of veteran dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.<\/p>\n

Forces loyal to the unity government are fighting to drive the Islamic State(IS) group out of the its coastal stronghold of Sirte.<\/p>\n

The two-month battle has killed around 250 pro-GNA fighters and wounded more than 1,400, according to medical sources at the unity forces’ command centre.<\/p>\n

The GNA arrived in the capital three months ago, but it has not been endorsed by Libya’s elected parliament, while a rival political authority based in the country’s far east has refused to cede power. <\/p>\n

A controversial general, Khalifa Haftar, controls forces loyal to this authority.<\/p>\n

“I want to meet General Haftar, to see and understand his position. I contact him every week to arrange a meeting, but so far he has refused,” Kobler said. <\/p>\n

Libya’s UN-backed presidential council would meet on Monday and Tuesday with “influential security parties” for further talks on a unified army, he said, without specifying who these parties would be.<\/p>\n

\"Libya's<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{UN envoy Martin Kobler said that General Khalifa Haftar has repeatedly refused meetings to discuss disunity of Libya’s military forces.} The head of Libya’s unity government on Sunday urged his countrymen to close ranks to overcome political divisions in a nation already wracked by the threat of militants. Prime Minister-designate Fayez al-Sarraj spoke to reporters […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[2650],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-27002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-middle-east-eye"],"bylines":[{"id":2650,"name":"Middle East Eye","slug":"middle-east-eye","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":2650,"name":"Middle East Eye","slug":"middle-east-eye","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27002\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27002"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=27002"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=27002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}