Days before Libyan military commander Khalifa Haftar launched an offensive to seize the capital and attempt to unite the divided country under his rule, Saudi Arabia promised tens of millions of dollars to help pay for the operation, according to senior advisers to the Saudi government.
The offer came during a visit to Saudi Arabia that was just one of several meetings Mr. Haftar had with foreign dignitaries in the weeks and days before he began the military campaign on April 4.
Foreign powers including the U.S. and the European Union have looked to Mr. Haftar, whose forces control much of eastern Libya, as a necessary participant in peace negotiations with the United Nations-backed government in Tripoli.
Conflict Zone
Libya is split between an internationally recognized government in Tripoli and a rival one in the eastern cities of Tobruk and Bayda.
Areas of control
Internationally recognized government
and allied forces
Forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar and the
Libyan National Army
Other groups
Mediterranean Sea
Tripoli
Bayda
TUN.
Misrata
Tobruk
Benghazi
Ghadamis
LIBYA
EGYPT
ALGERIA
SUD.
NIGER
CHAD
Source: Live Universal Awareness Map
While the U.S. and EU called on Mr. Haftar to avoid military conflict, other powers have provided weapons, funds and other support that have aided his quest to take control of the oil-rich North African state.
Foreign contacts—even to encourage peace—have secured the status of the Libyan warlord. “They thought he was agreeing to a diplomatic process. He thought he was building up his power,” said Jonathan M. Winer, the former U.S. special envoy to Libya.
The Saudi government didn’t respond to a request for comment on the offer of funds. Mr. Haftar accepted, according to the senior Saudi advisers. “We were quite generous,” one of them said.
A spokesman for Mr. Haftar didn’t respond to a request for comment on the Saudi pledge and other foreign contacts.
The offensive on Tripoli represents the latest upheaval in a country that has lurched from crisis to crisis since longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi was overthrown and killed in a 2011 armed uprising. The chaos that ensued provided ground for Islamic State to operate and offered a route for hundreds of thousands of migrants to reach Europe in recent years.
Share Your Thoughts
What should a political settlement look like in Libya? Join the conversation below.
Libya is now split between the internationally recognized government in Tripoli and a government allied with Mr. Haftar based in eastern Libya.
“Haftar would not be a player today without the foreign support he has received,” said Wolfram Lacher, a Libya expert at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. “The last few months, pretty much everyone jumped on the Haftar train.”
On the day after Mr. Haftar launched the assault on Tripoli, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres visited the commander to urge him to abandon any offensive and help revive a U.N.-sponsored peace process. Mr. Guterres said he left the country “with a heavy heart and deeply concerned.”
Such visits have become more frequent as Mr. Haftar’s influence in Libya has grown. Days earlier, Mr. Haftar had hosted a delegation of ambassadors and officials from 13 European states and the EU, who urged him to stand down.
The following day, on March 27, he was welcomed in Riyadh by Saudi King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. Undisclosed by the Saudi government at the time, he also met Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, along with Saudi Arabia’s interior minister and intelligence chief, according to two Saudi officials.
The Saudi government didn’t respond to a request for comment about Mr. Haftar’s meetings in the kingdom or the offer of funding.
“King Salman stressed the kingdom’s eagerness for security and stability in Libya,” the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs tweeted afterward.
The Saudis and some other Middle Eastern states have backed Mr. Haftar as a bulwark against Islamist groups, notably the Muslim Brotherhood, who took on a prominent role in Libya following the 2011 uprising and continue to participate in political life under the Tripoli government.
Mr. Haftar has received air support from the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, according to a U.N. panel monitoring the international arms embargo on Libya. Egypt denies this, and the U.A.E. hasn’t acknowledged or commented on the presence of its aircraft in Libya as documented by the U.N.
U.S. officials say Russia has sent weapons and military advisers, which the Kremlin denies.
The U.S., meanwhile, has backed Mr. Haftar’s rivals in Tripoli. But before the attack on the capital, Trump administration officials expressed a willingness for Mr. Haftar to play a role in Libya’s future under a possible political settlement.
President Trump’s national security adviser, John Bolton, spoke with him by phone the day before the attack on Tripoli and urged him to stand down, according to a senior Trump administration official.
“I suspect he was on the move already” when Mr. Bolton spoke to him, the official said.
After the attack began, the U.S. responded with a public call for Mr. Haftar to halt his offensive. “There is no military solution to the Libya conflict,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday. The following day, the U.S. military said it had pulled its small contingent of forces from the country.
Mr. Haftar has showed no signs of backing down. In recent days, his forces, attacking the outskirts of Tripoli from the south and west, have been slowed by resistance from militias that have often been at odds with one another but have united in opposition to a common foe.
The fighting has driven more than 6,000 people from their homes since April 4, according to the U.N. At least 58 people have died and 275 wounded, the U.N. said.
Mr. Haftar’s quest to consolidate power in Libya has deep roots, nourished over the years by various foreign governments.
As a military commander, Mr. Haftar broke with Ghaddafi in the 1980s and became part of a C.I.A.-backed effort to destabilize the Libyan regime. He then spent two decades in exile in the U.S., before returning to join the rebellion in 2011.
In 2014, Mr. Haftar launched a military campaign he said was intended to snuff out terrorists, a term he applied to a swath of Islamist groups and other opponents. Foreign air power and hardware gave Mr. Haftar’s forces an edge in a country divided among an array of lightly armed factions.
In 2016, France sent special forces to fight Islamist militants around the city of Benghazi in cooperation with Mr. Haftar’s troops.
Russia flew Mr. Haftar to an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean in 2017 in a display of support. The Kremlin has cultivated ties with both sides of the Libyan conflict as it seeks to expand its regional influence to the southern shores of Europe.
With the foreign backing, Mr. Haftar’s forces established loose control over a huge section of the country, including the eastern city of Benghazi and much of its physical oil infrastructure. In recent months his forces swept into southern Libya before turning north toward the capital.
Close observers of Libya say that Mr. Haftar has interpreted increased international attention as a sign of his legitimacy.
“Haftar did not want to be part of the solution. He wanted to be the solution,” said Mr. Lacher.
Libya Divided
Since the 2011 death of Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi, this oil-rich North African country has become a theater of rival, foreign-backed governments and militias pushing different agendas. In the chaos, Islamic State has taken root and migrants from the Middle East and Africa are flowing through to Europe. At stake now as fighting heats up again isn’t just Libya’s stability but billions of dollars in oil revenue. Here are the main rival players in the country’s volatile political mix:
- The Government of National Accord: Established through a United Nations-brokered political deal in 2015, the Tripoli-based government is headed by Prime Minister Faiez Serraj. It is backed by militias, including powerful ones in Misrata, and security forces under the government’s nominal control. The Tripoli government also controls the central bank and the country’s vast oil revenues under the auspices of the National oil company. Aside from the U.N., its international backers include the U.S. and the European Union, with which the government cooperates to halt illegal migration across the Mediterranean. The U.S. has launched hundreds of airstrikes to help the government drive Islamic State from its foothold in Sirte city in 2016.
- The Eastern government: A rival government is based in the eastern cities of Tobruk and Bayda, including a Parliament in Bayda. It is allied with Khalifa Haftar, the renegade military commander whose self-proclaimed Libyan National Army launched an assault on Tripoli on Friday. His militias have gradually established control over a huge swath of Libya. The group’s international backers include Egypt, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates. Libya’s oil revenues still go to government in Tripoli, which also controls the central bank, but Mr. Haftar and his militias control most of the oil infrastructure. Their attempts to independently export the oil last year were blocked by a U.N. embargo on illicit sales.
—Laurence Norman in Brussels and Vivian Salama in Washington contributed to this article.
Write to Jared Malsin at jared.malsin@wsj.com and Summer Said at summer.said@wsj.com
https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-arabia-promised-support-to-libyan-warlord-in-push-to-seize-tripoli-11555077600
2019-04-12 15:33:00Z
52780266935184
