Libya’s unity government yet to be approved issued Monday a decree freezing all state and institutions bank accounts expect for accounts for state salaries.
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The statement, received by AFP and published on the website of the justice ministry of the unrecognised Tripoli authorities, said the decision to step aside was taken to prevent further divisions and bloodshed.
The move came almost a week after UN-backed prime minister-designate Fayez al-Sarraj arrived with members of his cabinet in the capital by sea, after the Tripoli authorities closed airspace to keep him out.
Libya descended into political turmoil and armed conflict following an uprising that toppled long-time strongman Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, with two pairs of rival parliament and governments operating in Tripoli and the country’s east.
The Tripoli authorities were “no longer responsible… for what could happen in the future”, it added.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has welcomed Serraj’s arrival, as did the United Nations envoy to Libya, Martin Kobler, who was in Tripoli on Tuesday and said he received a warm welcome by a population exhausted of war.
Late Sunday, the Tripoli-based Libyan Investment Authority threw its support behind Sarraj’s Government of National Accord (GNA).
The unity government has been formed under a power-sharing agreed by some lawmakers in December.
The Faiez Serraj-led Presidency Council, since arriving in the capital Tripoli last Wednesday, has sought to assert its authority and has been enjoying approval of key actors including the Libyan Tripoli-based National Oil Corporation (NOC) in control of the country’s oil production and sale. “The immediate challenge is to end the cash crisis”, Mattia Toaldo, a policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said earlier in the week.
Control of the oil industry is essential for the new government, which not only needs to unite a divided country but also rebuild its economy.
“Tunisia has reopened its embassy…”
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“The question of the return of our embassies is obviously a relevant one”, he told reporters in Paris after talks with German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier. We are working on it if the security conditions are guaranteed…
