A representative of Libya's eastern government accused on Tuesday the UN-recognized western Government of National Accord of failing to manage the country's illegal migrant and human trafficking crisis
BRUSSELS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 15th October, 2019) A representative of Libya's eastern government accused on Tuesday the UN-recognized western Government of National Accord of failing to manage the country's illegal migrant and human trafficking crisis.Libya's proximity to Europe via the Mediterranean Sea has made it a major transit route for illegal migrants seeking to reach Europe's shores. Many migrants are rescued by Libyan authorities off Tripoli's coast and are then placed in detention centers. On Friday, the UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, said that there were over 3,500 migrants being held in the centers who were subject subject to "horrific" forms of harm in the hands of smugglers in Libya and called on Tripoli to close the centers.
"The migration problems are mounting. These are not only issues of migration, but there is also a problem of human trafficking in Tripoli [GNA seat]," Abdulhadi Ibrahim Lahweej, the foreign minister in the eastern Tobruk-based and Libyan National Army (LNA)-backed government, said at a press conference in Brussels.
Lahweej added that no illegal migrants had crossed the over to Europe from Libya and that detention centers in the east were equipped with all necessary provisions.
Earlier on Tuesday, Libya's navy confirmed the rescue of 94 migrants off Tripoli's coast and said that all of the migrants had been transferred to the Anti-Illegal Immigration Department.
Libya is divided between two governments, with the country's eastern half controlled by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar's LNA in cooperation with the authorities in Tobruk, while the western half is headed by the UN-backed GNA.
In April, the LNA launched an offensive to retake Tripoli from forces loyal to the GNA. The latter responded by launching a counteroffensive called Volcano of Rage.�
