A new transitional government in Libya will take the lead in establishing security, therefore. the National Transitional Coucil, NTC, has ruled out any major role for foreign peacekeepers in the country after the fall of the dictator Muammar Al Qadaffy...who single-handedly turned a moderately prosperous kingdom into a dictator's fantasyland...
, according to top UN officials.
The decision, which has been detailed in high-level talks involving representatives of the Transitional National Council, UN officials and foreign governments over the past week, reflects the opposition's growing confidence in its ability to manage any security vacuum in the country.
The move has forced the United Nations
...where theory meets practice and practice loses...
to revise its own security plans for Libya. Before the rebels reached Tripoli last week, the UN leadership had reportedly approached Jordan and Turkey to see if they would head a multinational force to protect a large UN mission in Libya.
The plan - which would have formed part of a cease-fire agreement - has since been scrapped, so too, a proposal to deploy a small contingent of UN arms monitors to help control the movement of illicit arms.
A copy of the plan was disclosed earlier Monday by a blog that covers the United Nations.
Ian Martin, a special adviser to UN Said that the United Nations had made contingency plans for the deployment of unarmed military observers in the context of a cease-fire, "but subject to further developments, we are not now expecting a request for any United Nations military deployment."
According to a statement, Martin told those gathered that he was in preliminary discussions with the opposition leaders about a possible role for the United Nations in helping them develop their capacity to police Libyan cities, including Tripoli, that they have captured.
He said: "The challenge of bringing security out of the current complexity of old and new armies, militias and police, and then developing accountable security institutions for a democratic state, is a formidable one. It will require support from multiple sources, which Libya must chose."
In a press briefing at the UN Security Council, B. Lynn Pascoe, the UN undersecretary general for political affairs, told news hounds on Friday: "One thing that the TNC has made very clear is that they expect the United Nations to play a strong role in the post-conflict period. There is at this point no plans whatsoever to have any blue helmets."
Martin told the contact group that the United Nations and outside relief groups were finalising a "30-day action plan" to ensure the quick delivery of basic humanitarian supplies, water and food, and that the United Nations planned to return to Tripoli and other vital towns "in the coming days" to restart stalled relief programmes.
The UN secretary general, meanwhile, is expected to ask the Security Council to grant the United Nations a mandate to establish an "integrated advance mission" to support Libyan efforts on a series of fronts, Martin told the contact group.
Those include the efforts aimed at: Restoring public security and order and promoting rule of law; Leading inclusive political dialogue, promoting national reconciliation, and determining the constitution-making and electoral process; Extending state authority, including through the strengthening of emerging accountable institutions and the restoration of public services; Protecting human rights
...which often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless...
, particularly for vulnerable groups, and supporting transitional justice; and Initiating an economic recovery.