Surging COVID-19 Deepening Libya Crisis – Red Cross

Coronavirus cases have skyrocketed 15-fold in Libya since June, the Red Cross said Thursday, warning this was further deepening the dire humanitarian crisis in the conflict-ravaged country.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said known COVID-19 cases in Libya had soared from 571 in June to more than 9,000 on Thursday.

“There is a continuous degradation of the humanitarian situation in Libya,” ICRC president Peter Maurer told reporters, pointing out that after nine years of violent conflict, many families have seen any reserves they once had fully depleted.

Maurer, who travelled to Libya earlier this week, said the number of Libyans depending on humanitarian aid to survive had been steadily growing as homes and infrastructure have been destroyed and the economy has collapsed.

The crisis has now been “further accentuated by COVID”, he said.

“Infrastructure all over the country is falling apart,” he cautioned in a statement.

“People have little electricity, drinking water, sanitation, or medical care in the middle of a growing pandemic.”

Maurer said he had met with Libya’s eastern-based military commander Khalifa Haftar and with Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, who heads the UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA), based in Tripoli.

He said they had “long conversations on all aspects of humanitarian activity”, adding that he had stressed the importance of following international humanitarian law and protecting civilians.

“Despite the political and military and strategic confrontation, what I saw in my now third visit to Libya in the past two years, was an increasing readiness to engage” with ICRC, he said.

Libya has been in chaos since a Western-backed uprising toppled and killed longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011.

Haftar launched an offensive in April 2019 to seize Tripoli, but after 14 months of fierce fighting, the Turkish-backed pro-GNA forces expelled his troops from much of western Libya, and pushed them eastwards to Sirte, a gateway to Libya’s rich oil fields and export terminals.

While there remains a dire need to find a political solution to Libya’s conflict and multiple crises, Maurer said there seemed to be a growing appreciation of the need to facilitate the work of humanitarians on the ground.

He also said ICRC had recently been able to resume visits to detention centres in Benghazi, Misrata and Tripoli run by the justice ministries of the two opposing administrations.

While the organisation had yet to gain access to other places of detention, he said his discussions showed he had received positive signals that this could soon be possible.

AFP