BENGHAZI (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 28th April, 2020) The Libyan National Army (LNA) is withdrawing from the 2015 Skhirat Political Agreement, which led to the formation of the rival Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA), LNA's Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar said in an address to the nation on Monday, adding that this "suspicious" deal destroyed the country.
On Thursday, Haftar urged the Lebanese to reject the Skhirat agreement. On Friday, Aguila Saleh, the speaker of the eastern-based Libyan parliament, which supports the LNA, put forward a road map on the Libyan political settlement, offering to form the presidential council and a commission in charge of drafting the constitution.
"We have followed your [people's] response to our call, [and we] announce the withdrawal from the suspicious political agreement, which has destroyed the country and resulted in you [people] allowing the ones you saw [fit for it] to raise to power ... At this time, we are proud that Libyans have tasked the [LNA's] General Command with a historic mission in these exceptional circumstances to stop work within this political deal and make it a part of history," Haftar said.
The Libyan Political Agreement on the settlement of the internal conflict was signed in Morocco's Skhirat, under the auspices of the United Nations on December 17, 2015. The main point of the document, which took 14 months to coordinate, dealt with the formation of an interim Government of National Accord, which was meant to operate during a transitional two-year period. New parliamentary elections were also promised in the deal, but they never came to pass.
