‘Inclusive talks with all’ continuing on Libya: Italy

Florence, May 2 (IANS/AKI) Italy is "keeping up inclusive dialogue with all sides" in Libya to try and return the war-wracked country to peace and help its people choose "free and democratic" institutions in a UN-facilitated process, Foreign Minister Enzo Moavero Milanesi said on Thursday.

"We are maintaining inclusive dialogue with all sides in Libya to de-escalate the conflict, re-establish peace and resume the stabilisation process in order to allow the Libyan people to pick their institutions freely and democratically," he said.

Moavero was delivering the 'State of the Union' conference at the European University Institute in Fiesole outside Florence. It is the 9th edition of the annual meeting aimed at fostering high-level political debate on European themes, according to the Italian Foreign Ministry.

"The path is a very difficult one, as we have seen for many years and it is a process that can only take place under the auspices of the United Nations.

"This is why we are operating in close cooperation with the UN and its current special envoy (Ghassan Salame)," Moavero said.

Italy is seeking to play a leading diplomatic role in ending the conflict in its former colony. It has extensive energy interests in oil-rich Libya, from where hundreds of thousands of migrants have entered Italy aboard people smugglers' boats since 2015.

Libya's capital Tripoli has been in the throes of deadly clashes over the past month between eastern warlord Khalifa Haftar's self-styled Libyan National Army militia and those loyal to the UN-recognised unity government.

A total of 376 people, including 23 civilians, have been killed and 1,822 others, including 79 civilians, injured in the ongoing fighting since Haftar's LNA began an assault in early April to seized control of Tripoli, according to the UN.