LibyaFrance set to intervene in Libya “within three months”: Diplomats
Since the November 2011 toppling of Col. Qaddafi, Libya has ceased to exist as a unitary, cohesive state. Different armed militias control different parts of the country, and two governments and two parliaments claim to be the country’s legitimate rulers: The internationally recognized government operates out of Tobruk in northeast Libya, while the Islamist-led Libya Dawn government – backed by Turkey and Qatar – operates out of the capital Tripoli, which Dawn occupied in August. Jean-Yves Le Drian, France’s defense minister, said on Saturday that “the moment has come” to address the growing unrest in Libya, adding that France could launch a military intervention in Libya within three months. The French defense minister added that the question currently under discussion in Paris is not whether France will launch military strikes against the Islamist militias in Libya, but when.
Jean-Yves Le Drian, France’s defense minister, said that “the moment has come” to address the growing unrest in Libya, adding that France could launch a military intervention in Libya within three months. Le Drein was quoted by an Arab diplomat who spoke to the respected Arabic-language newspaper al-Sharq al-Awsat, which is published in London.
Le Drian spoke with the Arab diplomat on Saturday, while visiting French troops stationed in neighboring Niger.
The French defense minister added that the question currently under discussion in Paris is not whether France will launch military strikes against Islamist militias in war-torn Libya, but when.
Niger’s president Mahamadou Issoufou publicly called for French military intervention in Libya, a position supported by a number of other African states, including Mali and Senegal.
Le Drian celebrated the New Year with French soldiers at a French military base being built 100 kilometers from Niger’s border with Libya. The base is being built as part of a French-led, region-wide effort to prevent the flow of weapons and Islamist fighters from chaotic Libya further into the Sahel.
Middle East Eye reports that Le Drian, addressing French soldiers in the Niger capital of Niamey later on Thursday, called for international action to prevent Libya from becoming a “sanctuary for terrorists.”
Asked by journalists whether France would undertake a military intervention in Libya, Le Drian did not rule out the possibility, but stressed the importance of seeking a political solution.
“We first have to find a global roadmap on Libya,” he said
The next day, Friday, after a meeting with President Issoufou, Le Drian was more explicit.
“We think that the moment has come to ensure that the international community tackles the Libyan problem. I think this is also what President Issoufou believes.”
“Libya is in chaos today and it is a breeding ground for terrorists who threaten the stability of Niger and, further afield, France,” Le Drian added.
Le Drian has been advocating launching strikes against Islamist militants in Libya for a while now, but France’s foreign minister Laurent Fabius has made known his preference that France not go it alone.
France has a history of intervening militarily in Africa in order to restore stability (see “France reasserting its role as Africa’s indispensable power,” HSNW, 4 December 2013).
France assumed a leading role in the 2011 NATO-led intervention in Libya, which led to the November 2011 toppling of Col. Muammar Gaddafi. French warplanes were the first to bomb Gaddafi’s military positions.
In early 2013 the French military intervened in Mali after Islamist militias in the northern part of the country rebelled and declared that region the independent country of Azawad. When, in January 2013, the Islamists began to move south in an effort to take over the entire country of Mali, France launched Operation Serval, a full-scale campaign which succeeded not only in checking the Islamists’ move south, but in evicting them from northern Mali and re-unifying the country (see “French air strikes begin campaign to evict Islamists from Mali,” HSNW, 14 January 2013; “Concerns about Mali’s future as French prepare to leave,” HSNW, 19 March 2013; and Ben Frankel, “Short-sighted Tuareg leadership dooms independence quest,” HSNW, 17 July 2012).
Since the conclusion of Operation Serval, the French military has launched Operation Barkhane, which consists of stationing 3,000 French troops in Niger, Mali, Chad, Mauritania, and Burkina Faso as part of a broader counter-terrorism campaign in the Sahel.
Separately, France has also sent a few hundred troops to the Central African Republic to prevent clashes between Muslim and Christian militias there from turning, in the words of UN observers, into “another Rwanda” (see “UN approves intervention in Central African Republic as violence rages,” HSNW, 6 December 2013; and “First French casualties in the Central African Republic highlight mission’s difficulties,” HSNW, 18 December 2013).
