UN envoy warns Libya to speed up political road map or risk further instability

Hannah Tetteh urges Libyan factions to complete the roadmap’s first steps within the next month

A crucial question remains whether the road map will deliver genuine political change or become another failed international effort. Reuters

Libya risks further instability unless rival leaders move quickly to implement a long-awaited political road map, the UN envoy Hanna Tetteh told the Security Council on Tuesday.

Ms Tetteh, the UN’s Special Representative and head of the UN Support Mission in Libya (Unsmil), said the North African country “cannot afford continued delays” in carrying out the plan launched in August to revive its stalled political process.

She urged Libyan factions to complete the road map’s first steps within the next month to pave the way for long-delayed national elections. “I call on all Libyan leaders to engage constructively in their efforts to ensure that the first steps in the road map are completed,” she told the 15-member council.

Unsmil's new political road map for Libya aims to end years of division and pave the way for long-delayed national elections.

Launched in August, the plan outlines a sequenced process focused on unifying state institutions, agreeing on a constitutional basis and creating conditions for credible polls. It also offers several pathways, including adopting a constitution before elections or holding parliamentary votes first.

Ms Tetteh warned that earlier initiatives including the Libyan Political Agreement and the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum had faltered due to weak implementation, saying unresolved challenges could again block progress. Libya’s UN ambassador Taher El-Sonni questioned whether the new road map could succeed, calling for an end to what he described as “international tutelage”.

“If this is impossible after all these years, let the Libyan people take control,” he told the Council. “Everyone is looking forward towards progress on the political road map and a start of a political track, no matter the names and the plans, the initiatives our citizens want to see, tangible progress a reality that can give a little bit of hope in ending the vicious cycle in the country that has started years ago,” he added.

Ms Tetteh cautioned that previous agreements including the Libyan Political Agreement and the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum had failed to achieve consolidation due to weak implementation. Without addressing long-standing and emerging challenges, she warned, it would be difficult to achieve the central objectives of the new road map.

For many Libyans, she said, the most important question remains whether this road map will deliver genuine political change or become yet another in a series of failed international efforts to end the country’s decade-long deadlock.