What's In Blue

Posted Tue 25 Oct 2011

Monthly Council Consultations on Libya

Tomorrow (26 October) Council members will receive their monthly briefing on Libya from Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, B. Lynn Pascoe followed by informal consultations. It seems that the main focus of Pascoe’s briefing will be on the way forward for the Libyan government following Qaddafi’s death. It appears that Ian Martin, head of UNSMIL, may also update Council members on UNSMIL.

It is also possible that Russia may want to discuss its draft resolution on Libya which was circulated to Council members on Friday, 21 October. It seems the draft resolution suggests terminating the provisions in resolution 1973 for protection of civilians and the no-fly zone.

While Council members have not begun formal negotiations on the draft, Russia appears to believe that this is an issue that does not require much technical discussion and it might be possible to move forward on adopting the resolution relatively quickly. However, it appears that some members feel that there is a need for a more comprehensive approach and the Council should pursue this more gradually. Some Council members have also voiced concern about removing the provisions for protection of civilians before the Libyan National Transitional Council (NTC) requests otherwise.

In terms of timing, some Council members may also want to wait for NATO’s final end-date for its military campaign before making any decisions on Libya. Although NATO made a preliminary decision last week to end the campaign on 31 October, it appears that the NTC may want NATO to be involved for a longer period of time.

Apparently there is a second Russian Libya-related draft resolution which was shared with the P5 last week. It seems that this draft focuses on the possible illegal proliferation of arms, particularly man-portable surface-to air missiles, in the region. It appears this draft resolution would require the CTC and CTED to assess the threat posed by illegal proliferation of arms in the region and provide the Council with proposals to counter this threat.

While the timelines for adoption of these two resolutions are unclear, it appears that Council members are likely to be involved in negotiations over the two draft texts over the coming week.

The Council last discussed Libya on Thursday, 13 October when Ian Martin, head of the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), updated Council members by video-conference on UNSMIL.

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