U.S., Other U.N. Powers Back Arms Imports to Libya Despite Security Concerns
Faced with a refugee crisis and the Islamic State group, the North African country’s shaky government must now establish control.
By Paul D. Shinkman | Senior National Security Writer May 16, 2016, at 2:24 p.m.
The U.S. and other members of an international coalition working to establish some form of stability amid the violence in Libya said Monday they support sending weapons and other military supplies into the war-torn North African nation.
With a few exceptions, the U.N. currently bans sending weapons into Libya. But in a communique signed by the U.S., the four other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and more than a dozen other countries, the coalition said it would support exemptions to the embargo requested by the the makeshift Libyan Government of National Accord – the country's provisional government created in December.
"The Government of National Accord has voiced its intention to submit appropriate arms embargo exemption requests to the U.N. Libya Sanctions Committee to procure necessary lethal arms and materiel to counter U.N.-designated terrorist groups and to combat Da'esh throughout the country," the joint communique said, using an alternative name for the Islamic State group. "We will fully support these efforts while continuing to reinforce the U.N. arms embargo."
The announcement stemmed from a summit in Vienna convened by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry with his Italian counterpart, Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni, and raised immediate concerns about the prospect of sending lethal supplies into a country already rife with weapons.
But the presence in Libya of the Islamic State group and other extremists, compounded by a growing refugee crisis emanating from the country, leaves international powers with few other options.
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http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-05-16/us-other-un-powers-back-arms-imports-to-libya-despite-security-concerns
