Celebrating division as a success in Libya

This week, Libya witnessed two events that were celebrated as signs of progress, even though they express nothing more than the normalisation of division within what is supposed to be a single state. This happens in a country that the Greek historian Herodotus once described as “the source of all new things.” But what “new” can we speak of today, when novelty itself has become synonymous with fragmentation? The first event was the participation of forces from Libya’s rival governments—one based in the east and the other in the west—in joint US special forces training in the central city of Sirte. It was the first military exercise of its kind bringing together former adversaries from the civil war. The Flintlock […]