TRIPOLI: A convoy of fighters moved into Tripoli from the Libyan city of Misrata on Saturday to shore up the interim prime minister amid a push by the parliament to oust him in favor of its own candidate.
Interim Prime Minister Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah has sworn he will hand over power only after an election and has rejected the move by parliament this week to appoint former interior minister Fathi Bashagha to head a new government.
The convoy’s arrival underscored the danger of renewed fighting in Libya as the crisis plays out, following mobilizations in recent weeks by armed factions backing different political sides.
Saturday’s convoy, comprising more than 100 vehicles according to a witness, arrived after Dbeibah earlier on Saturday accused the parliament of being “responsible for all this bloodshed and chaos” in Libya over recent years.
The parliament speaker, Aguila Saleh, has accused Dbeibah of corruption and of seeking to use his position for his own ends rather than to effect a meaningful transition.
Libya has had little peace since the 2011 Nato-backed uprising against Muammar Qadhafi and it split in 2014 between warring factions in east and west.
During the war, the parliament mostly sided with the eastern-based forces of Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA). The main armed forces from Misrata were on the other side, backing the then internationally recognized government in Tripoli.
Dbeibah was installed last year as head of the Government of National Unity (GNU), a body that was put in place through an UN-backed process to unify Libya’s divided institutions and oversee the run-up to elections in December.
