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  • Flooding in Libya leaves 2,000 people feared dead and more missing after storm collapsed dams

    Mediterranean storm Daniel caused devastating floods in Libya that broke dams and swept away entire neighborhoods in multiple coastal towns in the east of the North African nation. As many as 2,000 people were feared dead, one of the country’s leaders said Monday. The destruction appeared greatest in Derna, a city formerly held by Islamic extremists in the chaos that has gripped Libya for more than a decade and left it with crumbling and inadequate infrastructure. Libya remains divided between two rival administrations, one in the east and one in the west, each backed by militias and foreign governments.

  • Libya’s foreign minister fired after meeting Israeli counterpart 

    Libya’s Foreign Minister Najla al-Mangoush has been dismissed from her post after she met her Israeli counterpart in Italy last week. Her dismissal, first reported by Al Jazeera, comes after she was suspended from her role on Sunday and shortly afterwards fled the country and headed to Turkey. There is also mounting pressure on the Libyan government to explain how Mangoush left Libya when she was on a list of people barred from leaving the country pending the conclusion of an investigation.

  • Saudi Arabia expresses deep concern over armed clashes in Libya capital

    Tripoli’s worst armed clashes in a year have killed 55 people and wounded 146, Libyan media reported as a truce took hold. Fighting erupted on Monday night and raged through Tuesday between the influential 444 Brigade and the Al-Radaa, or Special Deterrence Force, two of the myriad of militias that have vied for power in the country since the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.

  • Militia clashes rock Libya’s capital, leaving civilians trapped, health ministry says

    Clashes between rival militias in the Libyan capital have left residents trapped in their homes unable to escape the violence, the country's health ministry said Tuesday, in what appears to be the most intense fighting to rock Tripoli this year. Fighting broke out between the 444 brigade and the Special Deterrence Force late Monday evening, according to local media. Tensions flared after the head of the 444 brigade was allegedly detained by the other force at an airport in Tripoli earlier Monday, media reported.

  • Italy agrees to lift ban on flights from conflict-stricken Libya, officials say

    Commercial flights between Italy and conflict-torn Libya will resume in September after the Italian government agreed to lift a 10-year-long ban on civil aviation in the North African nation, one of Libya’s rival governments said Sunday. Abdul-Hamid Dbeibah, prime minister of the Tripoli-based government, said on Twitter that the Italian government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni informed his government of the decision. He called the removal of the ban a “breakthrough.”

  • Libya’s ongoing debate over the role of political parties

    Over the past nine years, Libya’s parties have operated as shadow players in the country’s fractious politics. During the 2014-20 civil conflict, there were frequent calls to ban political parties outright as polarization deepened and people sought scapegoats for the country’s derailed transition. Libya’s political landscape now looks very different. Several of the main formations that emerged in 2012 have since either been riven by infighting or have faded away. Most notably, the two dominant groups in that year’s election — the Brotherhood-affiliated Justice and Construction Party (JCP) and its main rival, the National Forces Alliance (NFA) — have experienced splits. Those new to the scene include parties associated with the so-called “Greens,” or former regime figures and sympathizers, plus more tribal or regionally oriented parties.

  • Libya 6+6 deal: Loopholes cast doubt on democratic elections

    Libya’s feuding parties have reached an agreement on legal steps to hold long-delayed elections in the troubled North African nation, yet contentious issues blocking the democratic process remain unresolved, according to observers and a copy of the agreement seen by Al Jazeera. A 6+6 committee drawn from Libya’s two rival legislative bodies – the Tobruk-based House of Representatives (HoR) and the Tripoli-based High Council of State (HCS) – agreed on June 6 on draft laws for presidential and parliamentary elections, inching forward in the country’s current political crisis.

  • BBC journalists kidnapped in Libya released after diplomatic pressure

    Three BBC journalists and a Swedish reporter were abducted in Libya and later released following diplomatic pressure from the British organization and the two governments, media reported on Monday. The reporters were kidnapped and interrogated in a torture cell for five days by intelligence agents shortly after their arrival in Libya in March.

  • Eastern Libya forces stage mass deportation of Egyptian migrants

    Eastern Libyan forces have expelled thousands of Egyptians who were in Libya illegally in recent days, deporting them to Egypt on foot across the land border, an Egyptian security source and an eastern Libyan security source said. The Libyan security source said 4,000 migrants had been found during raids on people traffickers following a shootout between security forces and smugglers and they were all deported.

  • Can oil money and fancy shopping malls finally unite Libya?

    Libya has been split into two since 2014, with opposing governments located in the east and west of the country respectively. A United Nations-backed administration known as the Government of National Unity is based in Tripoli in the west, and its rival, known as the House of Representatives, is based in the east, in Tobruk. Each is supported by a number of local militias and foreign powers, and each has tried to wrest control from the other. However, after several years of fighting and instability, the violence has largely subsided and most recently, it is the country's economic prognosis that has been getting all the attention.