UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres yesterday flew to eastern Libya to meet commander Khalifa Haftar, whose forces are advancing on Tripoli now held by an internationally recognized government.
Troops allied to the Tripoli government moved more vehicles from the western city of Misrata to Tripoli to defend the capital against Haftar’s forces, who are allied to a parallel administration in the east, residents said.
The advances by the Benghazi-based eastern forces marked a dramatic escalation of a power struggle that has dragged on since the overthrow of former Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
They also surprised the UN, with Guterres in Tripoli this week to help organize a reconciliation national conference later this month.
Guterres, who spent the night in the UN compound in a Tripoli suburb, would also go to Tobruk, another eastern city, to meet lawmakers of the Libyan House of Representatives, also allied to Haftar.
“My aim remains the same: Avoid a military confrontation. I reiterate that there is no military solution for the Libyan crisis, only a political one,” Guterres said on Twitter.
Late on Thursday, House President Aguila Saleh issued a statement welcoming the offensive, a spokesman said.
Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) forces on Thursday took Gharyan, a city about 80km south of Tripoli, after brief skirmishes with forces allied to Tripoli-based Libyan Prime Minister Fayez al-Serraj.
However, the LNA did not succeed in taking a checkpoint west of the capital in a bid to close the coastal road to Tunisia, Tripoli’s main artery.
An armed group allied to the LNA withdrew overnight from the so-called Gate 27, 27km west of Tripoli, which was abandoned in the morning, a reporter said.
The renewed confrontation is a setback for the UN and Western countries, which have been trying to mediate between Serraj and Haftar.
The conference the UN is helping to organize is aimed at forging agreement on a road map for elections to resolve prolonged instability.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese