In order to help tackle the crisis in Libya, EU ministers want to revive Operation Sophia, the bloc’s naval mission in the Central Mediterranean.
“There’s an agreement in the Council in order to revive, refocus Operation Sophia,” said Josep Borrell, the EU’s diplomatic chief, after a meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday.
The gathering took place a day after a conference in Berlin brokered a truce — at least between France and Italy, and other foreign powers who have backed rival sides in the nearly decade-long Libyan conflict.
There is a fierce military confrontation in the North African country between the U.N-backed government of Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, and the strongman of the east of the country, Khalifa Haftar. Sarraj is backed by Rome, the former colonial power, and also by Qatar and Turkey. Haftar is backed by France, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Russia and the U.S.
European officials have often stressed they cannot afford for Libya to turn into another Syria, where the EU plays no concrete role. And in the final declaration of the Berlin conference, which was not signed off by the Libyan factions but only by their international protectors, all the parties agreed on a tentative cease-fire and to respect an arms embargo established by the United Nations Security Council.
Operation Sophia had a mandate to enforce the U.N arms embargo in Libya but the maritime mission has been unable to enforce it.
The point of Monday’s discussion was “how the EU can engage more forcefully,” Borrell said.
For days there has been talk in diplomatic circles about a possible naval mission to make sure the arms embargo is respected and some sort of military or civilian mission to monitor the cease-fire. Discussions continued at Monday’s meeting of foreign ministers.
When it comes to Operation Sophia, “we have not discussed all the details, we have discussed the framework and the general action in order to make the implementation of the Berlin conference efficient,” Romanian Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu told POLITICO.
As for the cease-fire, “monitoring can be done by an EU mission, which might be a civilian-military mission … or a military mission. And one of the conclusions of today’s discussion is that the High Representative [Borrell] will ask the competent structures of the EU to elaborate on a mandate for such a mission,” Aurescu said.
European Commission foreign policy chief Josep Borrell | Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP via Getty Images
Operation Sophia had a mandate to enforce the U.N arms embargo in Libya but the maritime mission has been unable to enforce it.
The operation, headquartered in Rome, was launched as a naval mission in June 2015 at the peak of Europe’s migration crisis to disrupt networks of people smugglers. In June 2016 and again in July 2017, the mandate was expanded to include tasks such as the implementation of the U.N. arms embargo on the high seas off the coast of Libya and gathering information on illegal trafficking of oil exports from the North African country.
Yet, under a compromise deal agreed in March last year, under pressure from Italy’s then-Interior Minister Matteo Salvini of the far-right League, the operation’s lifespan was extended on the condition that it use only its air assets and not its ships. Salvini didn’t want migrants rescued by Operation Sophia to be dropped off in Italy.
With Salvini out of government, Rome is now on board to revive Sophia but “it must be a mission to monitor the embargo and nothing else,” Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said after the meeting.
Borrell said that the EU’s Political and Security Committee, made up of member countries’ ambassadors and which deals with defense and foreign policy issues, has now been tasked with redefining Sophia’s mandate. EU foreign ministers are expected to take a decision at a meeting on February 17.