Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said Egypt’s actions in Libya and its support for the eastern-based forces of Khalifa Haftar were illegal.
Erdogan was responding to a question about Egypt’s possible intervention in Libya’s conflict, where Ankara has supported the Tripoli administration force Haftar’s self-styled ‘Libyan National Army’ (LNA) to abandon an offensive on Tripoli.
Egypt’s Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi said on Thursday that Egypt will not stand idle in the face of any direct threat to Egyptian and Libyan security, after lawmakers allied with Haftar urged Cairo to intervene militarily in the country’s civil war.
Libyan official rejects Egypt’s intervention threats
In the same context, GNA interior minister said ‘Egypt must realize that its interest is with the legitimate government in Libya’.
The senior Libyan official on Friday slammed Egypt’s Sisi over recent threats to intervene militarily and arm tribes in the country.
Libya’s Interior Minister Fat’hi Bashagha said on Twitter that his country would not accept steps “to undermine [Libyan] sovereignty or bypass the legitimate government.”
Egypt’s Abdel Fattah al-Sisi met on Thursday with the heads of Libyan tribes in his country’s capital Cairo, warning that Egypt would “not stand aside” in the face increasing military mobilization near the city of Sirte in the north of Libya.
“The leadership in brotherly Egypt must realize that its interest is with the legitimate government in Libya,” Bashagha added.
In June, al-Sisi suggested Cairo could launch “external military missions” into Libya, saying: “Any direct intervention in Libya has already become legitimate internationally.”
Al-Sisi had said the capture of the city of Sirte and the al-Jufra airbase by the internationally recognized government would be Cairo’s “red line.” He called on Egypt’s army to “be prepared to carry out any domestic or cross-border missions.
The region is currently held by renegade general Khalifa Haftar.
Since April 2019, Haftar’s illegitimate forces have launched attacks on the Libyan capital of Tripoli and other parts of northwestern Libya, resulting in more than 1,000 deaths, including civilian women and children.
However, the Libyan government has recently achieved significant victories, pushing Haftar’s militias out of Tripoli and the strategic city of Tarhuna.
