Migrant smuggling and spread of Islamic state: lords committee to scrutinise situation in Libya
On Thursday 9 July a House of Lords Committee will hold a one-off evidence session asking what can be done about the growth of ISIL in Libya, and the issue of migrant smuggling.
The EU External Affairs Sub-Committee will put questions to former British Ambassador to Libya, Sir Dominic Asquith, and Professor George Joffe, of the University of Cambridge.
Dominic Asquith was the British Ambassador to Libya until 2012, and was a senior diplomat in Iraq and Egypt before then. Professor Joffe, a Senior Fellow of the Centre of International Studies in Cambridge, specialises in North Africa.
The evidence session will cover a variety of issues, including:
- The emergence of ISIL in Libya, its connections to Iraq and Syria, and local power structures.
- Migrant smuggling, and the effectiveness of EU action, including the EU naval mission in the Southern Central Mediterranean, in tackling them.
- EU strategy to combat insecurity in the region, and use of foreign policy tools.
- Arms trafficking, and the effectiveness of the UN arms embargo.
- EU and UK visibility in the Libyan Government-forming process, and EU influence in the wider region.
The session will be webcast at http://parliamentlive.tv/Lords and is also open to the public. Journalists wishing to attend should go to Parliament's Cromwell Green Entrance and should allow time for security screening.
