Libya’s chaos: Western powers stress need for ‘political solution’

The “brutal” recent beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians by militants affiliated to the Islamic State group demonstrated “once again the urgent need for a political solution to the conflict,” a statement issued in the name of the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain said, according to an Italian version of the text released by the foreign ministry in Rome. Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, whose air force bombed Islamic State targets in Libya on Monday, asked the United Nations Security Council to authorize intervention in the North African nation. Italy, Libya’s former colonial ruler, said it would consider sending a force under a U.N. mandate.

We’ve been saying at every level that Libya is out of control for three years and we’ll keep doing so.

Matteo Renzo, Italian Prime Minister

More than three years after NATO-led airstrikes helped Libyan rebels end Moammar Gadhafi’s four decades of autocratic rule, the crisis in the holder of Africa’s largest oil reserves is posing a threat to its neighbors as well as European interests. A power struggle between Islamists and the elected Libyan government has divided the country, complicating any foreign military intervention. Airstrikes alone won’t be enough to restore stability, political analysts in Egypt and the region say, noting limited progress made by the U.S.-led bombing campaign in Iraq and Syria in defeating Islamic State.

If you want to intervene in the Libyan civil war, my message is good luck with that. It’s going to be very complicated and very messy and possibly very ineffective.

Mattia Toaldo, a Libya analyst at the European Council on Foreign Relations in London

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