The Libyan Political Dialogue Forum, which was initially set to meet for four days on 28 June in Switzerland, has now been extended. UN Geneva headquarters spokesman Réal Leblanc, who announced this at a briefing in Geneva on Friday, made it clear that no deadline had been set for the meeting to end at the moment
“The meeting was supposed to end today, but it may be decided to extend it”, – he said. LeBlanc recalled that the forum was originally planned as a four-day forum (from 28 June to 1 July), but was later extended.
A source in the Libyan parliament told on Thursday that “as a result of ongoing disagreements between the participants, the forum has been extended until Saturday”. He said “this is the last chance to reach an agreement on the legal and constitutional basis for the legislative and presidential elections”.
The UN secretary-general’s special envoy for Libya, Jan Kubiš, attended Thursday’s meeting by video link because he had contracted a coronavirus. As Real Leblanc noted at a briefing in Geneva on Friday, Kubiš “is feeling well, following the meeting closely” and apparently “his quarantine will soon be over”.
The Libyan Political Dialogue Forum began work on Monday to discuss preparations for the elections, which are scheduled for 24 December. According to the UN support mission in Libya, the meeting, held at an unnamed location “on the outskirts of Geneva”, is an opportunity for forum members to develop proposals on how to further facilitate the elections as they relate to the constitutional basis of the elections. Speaking at the opening of the forum on 28 June, Kubiš lamented that parliament had still not clarified the constitutional basis of the elections and had not passed relevant legislation. He called for “overcoming the divisions and trust deficit and focusing in the coming days on reaching a broad consensus as far as possible”.