Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 11/2014

Ending Libya's Civil War: Reconciling Politics, Rebuilding Security

Frederic Wehrey

September 2014

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Abstract

More than three years after the fall of strongman Muammar Qaddafi, Libya is in the midst of a bitter civil war rooted in a balance of weakness between the country’s political factions and armed groups. With a domestic landscape torn apart by competing claims to power and with interference from regional actors serving to entrench divides, restoring stability in Libya and building a unified security structure will be difficult if not impossible without broad-based political reconciliation.