War could break out in Libya again, army general warns

Libya’s Commander of the Western Military Zone’s Joint Operations Room, Major General Osama Juwaili, said yesterday that he does not rule out the possibility that “war breaks out in the country again”.

Juwaili rejected the letter of the 5+5 Joint Military Commission (JMC) to the Presidential Council, Government of National Unity (GNU), and the UN Support Mission (UNSMIL) in which the JMC demanded military agreements and memoranda of understandings that had been signed by the previous legitimate Government of National Accord (GNA) be frozen.

“Agreements with Turkey were requested by the legitimate GNA to help repel the offensive on Tripoli, while Russia and other countries which have troops on the ground in Libya have no legitimate agreements with the government,” General Juwaili said in a statement posted on Twitter.

On Saturday, the JMC called on the Libyan Presidential Council to freeze international agreements and MoUs concluded with any country.

On Sunday, the Libyan High Council of State demanded the JMC “distance itself” from political affairs and international agreements in the country.

This year Libya has witnessed a political breakthrough under UN auspices. On 16 March, an elected transitional authority, made up of a unity government and a presidential council, assumed their duties to lead the country through a transitional phase to parliamentary and presidential elections slated for 24 December.

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