US Secretary of State John Kerry greets Libya's Vice President of Parliament Emhemed Shoaib at UN, Oct., 2015. Kevin Hagen/Press Association. All rights reserved.After a year of intensive dialogue and shuttle diplomacy, an agreement between Libyan rivals was finally secured by the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), culminating in the Libyan Political Agreement (PA) signed last December. The following month, it was ratified by Libya’s House of Representatives (HoR).
However, the Libyan legislature fell short in completing its duties by failing to take the next two pivotal steps required to legally activate the PA. First, it was supposed to promulgate the constitutional amendment that gives the PA the necessary legal force to be part of the Libyan Constitutional Declaration and second, it was to hold the required confidence vote on the new government proposed by the Presidency Council appointed by the agreement.
After repeated attempts, a proper legislative session to complete these two tasks was never held. The result is a peculiar situation wherein an agreement has been adopted by opposing Libyan factions and recognized by the international community (Security Council resolution 2259/2015), but has not been enforced in the country.
