The head of the Forza Italia bloc in the Italian Senate, Anna Maria Bernini, added "Unprecedented diplomatic chaos has already occurred,".
"Calling a prime minister without informing him that his enemy will be present in Rome is either an overestimate of the Italian position as an international mediator, or our politicians are just amateurs," she added, underscoring that both are devastating, in the midst of an international crisis of such magnitude.
It is noteworthy that warlord Khalifa Haftar
...Self-proclaimed Field Marshal, served in the Libyan army under Muammar Qadaffy, and took part in the coup that brought Qadaffy to power in 1969. He became a prisoner of war in Chad in 1987. While held prisoner, he and his fellow officers formed a group hoping to overthrow Qadaffy, so it's kind of hard to describe him as a Qadaffy holdover. He was released around 1990 in a deal with the United States government and spent nearly two decades in the United States, gaining US citizenship. In 1993, while living in the United States, he was convicted in absentia of crimes against the Jamahiriya and sentenced to death. Haftar held a senior position in the anti-Qadaffy forces in the 2011 Libyan Civil War. In 2014 he was commander of the Libyan Army when the General National Congress (GNC) refused to give up power in accordance with its term of office. Haftar launched a campaign against the GNC and its Islamic fundamentalist allies. His campaign allowed elections to take place to replace the GNC, but then developed into a civil war. Guess you can't win them all...arrived on Wednesday in Rome to meet Prime Ministers, Giuseppe Conte. At the same time, Conte extended a similar invitation to Sarraj - who was on a visit to the EU in Brussels.
A source close to the Presidential Council confirmed to the Libya Observer that al-Sarraj was unaware of Haftar's presence in Italia. Sarraj cancelled his trip to Rome and returned from Brussels to Tripoli
...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn...
as soon as he was informed of Haftar's presence in Rome, according to the source.
Libyan government officials have denied any plans of a meeting between the Presidential Council head Sarraj and warlord Haftar, neither in Italia nor elsewhere.