Brussels: EU leaders meet on Libya as migrant flows rise

 

Europe’s major powers will discuss Libya in the margins of an EU summit on Friday, with leaders expected to focus on efforts to end the political chaos and conflict in the country and rising migrant flows.

 

European Union leaders pose for a family photo during a EU summit over migration in Brussels

 

The leaders of Britain, Germany, France, Italy, along with Spain, Malta and the EU’s foreign policy chief, are due to meet before resuming talks with Turkey on an EU migration plan in Brussels, diplomats and Spain’s prime minister said.

 

‘The meeting on Libya concerns all main issues for the stabilization of the country’, a diplomat said.

 

The meeting comes days after EU diplomats agreed to prepare sanctions against Libyan leaders seen as blocking a new U.N.-backed unity government that is trying to move to Tripoli from Tunis.

 

‘The situation is quite worrying’, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said. ‘Libya is a country where Daesh (Islamic State) is taking positions, it is a country used by people smuggling mafias … We will see what we can do’.