4. Armed Groups in Southern Libya

Libya’s south continues to suffer the consequences of local power struggles and clashes that followed the retrenchment of the state after 2011. The region’s problems have been exacerbated by ongoing battles between actors on the western and eastern coasts. Beyond military tensions, southern preoccupations are clearly dominated by livelihood issues and public services. Due to stagnation in the public and private sectors, the formal economy in this region has little to offer in terms of employment and sources of revenue. Public infrastructure has been deteriorating for years, public service provision is poor, and state institutions are barely functioning. Public sector salaries are often delayed as cash deliveries are interrupted. Politics is thus in some respects of secondary concern while ‘the citizen is busy thinking about his next trip to the gas station, how he will get bread and whether there will be power at home’. As reflected in our interviews, many southerners share a sense of indignation about what they see as the ‘monopolization’ of state institutions and resources by northern Libyans.

Community relations

Southern communities are strongly influenced by tribal customs and modes of operation. The tribe is the primary identity marker, and city-based or regional identity is weak. Social leaders wield significantly more authority than formal governance actors, and customary forms of decision-making and justice prevail.

Southern Libya is divided into tribal zones of influence: large chunks of territory are governed by, and associated with, particular tribes and peoples. Roughly speaking, the westernmost part is under Tuareg dominance, while the Tebu are the most powerful group south of Sebha between Murzuq and Rebiana (near Kufra). Tebu and Tuareg have strong collective identities despite being subdivided into different branches, and their ethnic, cultural and linguistic specificities set them apart from their Arab neighbours. The northern part of the Fezzan region is predominantly Arab, home to numerous tribes. In Sebha, the Awlad Suleiman has become the most influential tribe since 2011, at the expense of the Gaddadfa. Wadi al-Shati is mainly under Magarha influence. Kufra, in the southeast, is dominated by the Zway tribe. A non-tribal population group known as the Ahali also inhabit parts of the Fezzan and central Libya.

While most towns are of mixed tribal composition, power relations tend to be unequal, as tribes of greater influence (whether demographic, military or other) usually dominate local governance and decision-making, especially in the security sector. In other words, each social component tries to be the bearer of influence and decisions in its area. As shown on numerous occasions since 2011, the contest for local hegemony is often violent, with dire consequences for civilian populations.

Historical grievances, aggravated by intercommunal conflicts post-2011, have eroded mutual trust and spurred tribal retrenchment and segregation. The competition for territory and resources in the south tends to be viewed as an existential struggle, in which the destiny of entire tribal and ethnic groups is at stake. Tribes that had been associated with the Gaddafi regime were sidelined after its fall, through public sector purges and, at times, collective retribution. Since around 2017, as the revolutionary narrative has lost traction, a reverse trend has been in evidence, with the pre-2011 actors re-emerging on the political, social and military scene. Yet the revolution left deep social rifts, and local peace processes remain inconclusive.

In the eyes of many Arabs, the cross-border ties of the Tebu and Tuareg ethnic groups constitute a destabilizing factor, accentuated by the proliferation of armed groups from these communities.

Social cohesion is also weakened by conflicting views on ethnicity, identity and statehood. In the eyes of many Arabs, the cross-border ties of the Tebu and Tuareg ethnic groups constitute a destabilizing factor, accentuated by the proliferation of armed groups from these communities. The rise in Tebu military power after 2011 has been a source of tensions with the Tebu’s Arab neighbours, and at times with Tuareg too. In reference to the Tebu and Tuareg consolidating territorial control, an interviewee in Sebha said: ‘Now when you go to Qatrun, you’re in a zone of influence, you go to Ubari you’re in another zone of influence. There has been demographic change.’ Indeed, the spectre of demographic change looms large in the south, but the underpinning arguments are often misinformed, and information is twisted in a way to discredit certain tribes.

Cross-border kinship ties and the absence of law and order certainly do account for recent arrivals from neighbouring countries – including of foreign fighters. What tends to be overlooked in these debates is that there are long-established communities in southern Libya that were never fully integrated. This is to a large extent rooted in Gaddafi’s policies, which involved state-sponsored mass immigration but also the use of Libyan citizenship as an instrument of foreign policy and domestic social control. Whole communities had their citizenship withheld or revoked, and as a result a large number of people remain in limbo with respect to their legal status. They include Tebu and Tuareg, as well as parts of the Arab Awlad Suleiman, Hasawna and Mahamid tribes. This issue, which is yet to be tackled by the state, continues to impact conflict dynamics and the security sector. Identity politics has given rise to pervasive quarrels over who holds a rightful claim to the land. Tebu and Tuareg often point out that their peoples’ presence in the south pre-dates by centuries the creation of the Libyan state, as a way to contest the dominant Libyan Arab identity narrative and portrayal of Tebu and Tuareg as ‘foreigners’.

Armed groups’ community bonds prevail over other forms of legitimization. Armed groups tend to draw heavily on the concept of social legitimacy: they claim to protect their communities against external threats and keep the areas under their control safe; in contrast, ideological motives (such as a revolutionary ethos or religious orientation) are of much lesser relevance. While groups do seek state recognition, both to bolster their image locally and to build capacity, such recognition is not essential to their survival.

Box 2: The LAAF’s expansion in the south

Broadly speaking, the Fezzan region in the south of the country has been a spectator to Libya’s political woes, and to northern power struggles. Armed actors in the south have little agency beyond their own areas. From 2011, competing revolutionary factions in the north would have their military operations and coalitions in the Fezzan authorized and funded through authorities in Tripoli. The Misratan Third Force deployed to Sebha at the start of 2014, mandated by the GNC to perform peacekeeping and stabilization functions in the Fezzan. Over the following two years, the force expanded its influence through local alliances, while also promoting Misratan business interests. Tribal and armed actors brandishing revolutionary rhetoric dominated the public scene, rationalizing discriminatory tribal politics as necessary to keep Gaddafi loyalist forces at bay.

The situation changed in 2017, when LAAF-backed forces gained ground in the region, drawing on the support of former members of the regime-era military and marginalized tribal elements. Spearheaded by the 12th Brigade in Wadi al-Shati, these groups confronted the Third Force and its southern allies, which were now endorsed by the GNA. After Misratan-led retaliation turned into a massacre at the Brak al-Shati airbase – much to the GNA’s embarrassment – the Third Force withdrew from the Fezzan. The region was left in limbo, with local security and governance actors seeking funds and patronage from both the GNA and the LAAF.

The LAAF’s general command started building a network in the Fezzan in 2016, gradually expanding it to different tribes and areas throughout 2017 and 2018. In addition to allies among the Magarha tribe and Tebu groups (some of which had been part of Haftar’s Operation Dignity in Benghazi), the LAAF enlisted Tuareg and Awlad Suleiman groups. Some of these had earlier been allied with Libya Dawn and the Third Force, while others had been linked to Gaddafi loyalist circles. The general command invested in these alliances by financing armed groups and linking them to one another through joint operations rooms. The general command also gradually gained support among the army officers staffing the southern military zones of al-Shati, Murzuq, Sebha and Ubari-Ghat. Sebha Military Zone has been under LAAF command since the start of 2017, when Haftar began appointing Sebha’s military governors, although the entity retained administrative ties to institutions in Tripoli.

When clashes erupted in Sebha at the start of 2018, the general command further undermined the GNA’s authority by incorporating the 6th Brigade, a key Sebha group, into the LAAF. This deepened the GNA–LAAF split in the local security sector. During that year, the LAAF conducted a series of operations targeting extremists and foreign militants scattered throughout the vast and sparsely inhabited region between Kufra and Sebha. Locals had been plagued by roadside robberies and kidnappings for ransom; this was in addition to attacks on security forces and public facilities in isolated locations from Tazerbu to al-Fuqaha. While the LAAF was gaining influence during this phase, a ‘final push’ was needed for it to consolidate its network and assert its dominance.

This push came in mid-January 2019. The LAAF launched a wide-scale operation in the Fezzan, officially referred to as the ‘South Liberation and Purge Operation’, ostensibly targeted at criminal gangs and foreign elements destabilizing the region. The level of mobilization left little doubt that the LAAF’s broader objective was to control the Fezzan, arguably in preparation for the subsequent Tripoli offensive.

LAAF units and affiliates from the northeast were dispatched to spearhead ground operations and ensure the alignment of southern armed groups with the general command. LAAF forces advanced rapidly, capitalizing on largely favourable public opinion and a lack of unity among their southern opponents. Plagued by rampant crime, insecurity and poor service provision, and disappointed with the GNA’s performance, many Fezzan residents were quick to welcome the troops.

In Sebha and Ubari, the LAAF encountered little resistance. An attempt by the GNA to mobilize troops against the LAAF under the leadership of Tuareg commander Ali Kanna was stifled when other Tuareg social and military leaders in Ubari came out collectively to declare their support for the LAAF. However, the pattern of peaceful takeover and realignment of local groups was disturbed at the start of February, when the LAAF launched an offensive on Murzuq and tensions between Tebu and Arabs erupted into hostilities. Insufficient negotiation or guarantees for Tebu in Murzuq prevented a peaceful takeover from being realized – instead, airstrikes by the LAAF and UAE forces in and around Murzuq led to civilian fatalities. The ground offensive was spearheaded by Battalion 128, a group from Sirte with a large component of Awlad Suleiman and Zway members, supplemented by Awlad Suleiman groups from Sebha as well as Sudanese fighters.

The concurrence of several factors – the indiscriminate airstrikes, the tribal composition of the advancing forces, and the involvement of individuals hostile to the Tebu community – galvanized Tebu opposition to the offensive. The South Protection Force – supported by a different set of Sudanese fighters – put up fierce resistance but could not prevent LAAF-aligned forces from entering Murzuq at the end of February 2019. This divided the town, as Ahali residents overwhelmingly welcomed these forces whereas many Tebu fled. The takeover was followed by assassinations and looting of property, which Tebu blamed both on locals and on fighters who had arrived under LAAF cover. After LAAF affiliates withdrew from the town, Tebu residents retaliated against their Ahali neighbours, and a cycle of tit-for-tat violence ensued.

The South Liberation and Purge Operation ended in early March with the sudden withdrawal of northern LAAF units from the Fezzan, leaving the maintenance of the ‘new order’ to local allies and affiliates.

As of early 2020, an assessment of the operation and of the LAAF’s overall role in the Fezzan showed a mixed picture. Throughout the operation (January–March 2019), some parts of the region saw a significant improvement in security. Tribal armed groups retreated or were co-opted. Formal policing and military structures were reactivated, and reinvigorated by the prospects of stronger leadership from the east. In other areas, however, the operation had a destabilizing effect. In particular, Murzuq descended into violence between Tebu and Ahali, at great human cost, with the hostilities causing mass displacement. In addition to spurring the militarization of the local community, the conflict has had wide repercussions across the region, fuelling ethnic hatred and providing opportunities for extremists to gain a stronger following.

The LAAF’s expansion has altered tribal relations, empowering Magarha and Awlad Suleiman actors but also providing an opportunity for Gaddadfa and Tuareg to reclaim a prominent place in the security sector. Generally speaking, the Tebu were disadvantaged the most by these developments. The conflict has weakened and divided their armed groups. At the end of 2019, however, the LAAF general command took steps to mend its relationship with Tebu leaders in Murzuq and Qatrun. It remains to be seen how these tribal power shifts will play out.

For the average citizen in the Fezzan, the LAAF’s ‘takeover’ of the region has brought little benefit so far. As the general command’s attention turned towards northwest Libya with the Tripoli offensive in April, progress in the Fezzan in terms of security provision stalled. Crime and turf wars picked up again. Smuggling – which had been suspended or diverted between January and March – has also resumed, now more prominently involving LAAF-affiliated actors. Southern bank branches are better supplied with cash. However, subsidized fuel and cooking gas are still unavailable. The LAAF general command used its Fezzan operation to demonstrate its capabilities and reinforce alliances, with a view to gaining the upper hand in western Libya. Its allies in the Fezzan may later reap the benefits of LAAF support, but the costs of alliance are significant: many armed groups (for example, in Sebha, Wadi al-Shati, Ubari, Ghat etc.) have dispatched units to back the LAAF’s Tripoli offensive, with the result that southerners are dying on the front lines.

Make-up and structure

The military establishment has a strong standing in the south, due to large-scale recruitment during the Gaddafi era, but it has been fragmented and without clear leadership since 2011. Members of the regular army were demobilized, often remaining without salaries for years. Many joined armed groups of mixed military and civilian composition, formed along tribal lines and structured in ways that do not conform with military hierarchy. Pre-2011 military units that remained intact became subservient to revolutionary command structures and were sidelined by tribal armed groups. Attempts to unify military entities at the regional level (such as a 2016 initiative by the Tuareg commander Ali Kanna) failed. Nowadays, many southerners wish to see a national unified military that is institutionally strengthened in order to improve security and counter tribal entrenchment. The LAAF’s general command has put much emphasis on the role of military structures, supporting the existing military zones and creating new task-based structures such as the Deterrence Operations Group. Its military and nationalist narrative has motivated many pre-2011 army and police members to resume service after years of absence. Yet the LAAF’s tribal alliance-building and military campaigns in 2019 have also led to a certain loss of faith in this narrative. The military establishment remains weak due to several factors, namely the tribalization of the security sector and institutional and political divisions. In some areas there are parallel command structures – one responding to the LAAF and the other to the GNA. For example, there are two rival ‘Sebha Military Zones’. In February 2019, Prime Minister al-Serraj appointed Kanna as commander of Sebha Military Zone. Since the headquarters of this entity are at Tamanhint airbase – outside GNA-controlled territory – Kanna set up base in Ubari, operating remotely, with limited manpower and influence on the ground. Moreover, Kanna was forced to leave Ubari in November 2019, when the LAAF-appointed Commander of Southern Military Zones, Major-General Belgasem Labaaj, took control of the military base that had hosted Kanna.

Southern armed groups that sprung up after 2011 are more strongly connected to their immediate social environment than they are to any military ethos. Beneath the pervasive revolutionary discourse, tribal considerations became a more efficient vector for mobilization – especially in areas that witnessed communal conflict. The vast majority of groups are thus associated with a specific tribe, or interest group or family within a tribe. The social embeddedness of members of armed groups makes it difficult to differentiate between civilian and non-civilian actors. Fighters are often referred to as ‘armed youth’, reinforcing the image of armed groups being inseparable from their social environment. Describing the situation in Sebha between January and March, one young woman said: ‘I’ve been seeing more security in the streets, even at night. They are not police; they don’t have any official label. They are fellow residents, like brothers watching over you.’

Armed groups have permanent members, but there are also many fighters who mobilize only sporadically for policing tasks and when the community is under threat. These volunteers are not usually paid, and may have jobs to return to when they are no longer needed. External threats have kept communities together, reinforcing civilian–military linkages. When a community is under threat, tribal forces are usually able to rally support and emerge with greater authority and public backing. Frequent episodes of conflict in Sebha since 2012 have entrenched tribal armed groups in the city, providing them with free run of their neighbourhoods and protecting their illicit activities from scrutiny. In Ubari, Tuareg factions put their differences aside when they went to war against Tebu in 2014, and their Tebu opponents received backup from Tebu groups across the region. The 12th Brigade represents only a faction within the Magarha tribe, yet its armed confrontations with the Misratan Third Force motivated many Magarha to volunteer with the brigade. After it was targeted in the May 2017 massacre at Brak al-Shati airbase, the 12th Brigade enjoyed increased moral authority. When LAAF-affiliated groups forced their way into Murzuq in February 2019, Tebu rallied behind the newly set up South Protection Force, which resisted the offensive.

The pursuit of official mandates, affiliation and funds has led armed groups to change political allegiances repeatedly, and to rebrand themselves to fit trends and requirements.

Formal recognition has yielded benefits for armed groups without challenging their tribal backbone or core structure. The pursuit of official mandates, affiliation and funds has led armed groups to change political allegiances repeatedly, and to rebrand themselves to fit trends and requirements. Groups tend to use state recognition (from either or both the GNA or Interim Government) to set themselves apart from so-called ‘illegitimate’ rivals.

Yet labels reveal little about a group’s nature. Government attempts to amalgamate southern groups, whether through a top-down or bottom-up approach, have been of limited impact. The southern branch of the Libya Shield Force, for example, remained a hollow structure whose cohesion hinged on state salaries. The 6th Brigade was set up in 2013 as a ‘core army’, mandated by the GNC to keep the peace in Sebha, yet the brigade’s connection to the Awlad Suleiman tribe ultimately exacerbated tensions and turned it into a conflict party. Tribally mixed armed groups remain the exception. They include a few southern groups that espouse Madkhali-Salafi ideology and are aligned with the LAAF.

For the most part, however, inter-tribal military integration is limited to temporary alliances of convenience. In certain circumstances – for example, when there is a shared purpose or adversary – small armed groups join dominant players for a limited period as auxiliary forces, operating semi-autonomously and with varying degrees of oversight. The LAAF is promoting inter-tribal integration, enabling allied groups to recruit outside their home communities. An example is Battalion 128, whose core constituency is the Awlad Suleiman community of Harawa, near Sirte, but which has recently established units in different parts of the country, including a Tuareg group in Ubari. The impact of this strategy, which serves the LAAF’s war effort, is yet to be seen. Until now, southern armed groups have ultimately remained strongly connected to their core constituencies, while coalitions have disintegrated once their common objective has been achieved, or when relations between their component communities have soured.

Affiliation with the LAAF constitutes a vector of power through which armed groups can assert dominance within their communities and expand their membership and territory. On its part, the LAAF’s general command has strengthened its foothold in the south by empowering selected individuals as prime interlocutors for different tribes or areas. When the LAAF asserted its dominance in the region through the South Liberation and Purge Operation, armed groups were prompted to rally around these ‘chosen’ actors. Under LAAF leadership, the 12th Brigade’s long-time leader, army colonel Mohamed Bin Nayel, was made head of the Deterrence Operations Group in 2017 and also governor of the al-Shati Military Zone. The 12th Brigade has incorporated smaller entities and consolidated its position in the area from Sebha to Shweirif, which corresponds to the Magarha tribe’s zone of influence. In Sebha Masoud Jeddi, a military police officer who commands Battalion 116, has become the most prominent security figure in the Awlad Suleiman tribe since he sided with the LAAF in 2017 and was put in charge of the Sebha-Bawanis branch of the Deterrence Operations Group. After participating in the South Liberation and Purge Operation, Jeddi’s forces were mandated to secure strategic locations in Sebha, including the airport and fuel depot. Battalion 116 has seen an inflow of Awlad Suleiman combatants and auxiliary forces.

The functions of armed groups

Communities rely on social actors and armed groups for security and justice. Security is seen as a collective responsibility that requires the collaboration of both formal and informal actors, at least in smaller towns and at the neighbourhood level. ‘In the absence of the state as security provider, social components are the best alternative we have,’ a municipal worker in Sebha told Chatham House in March 2019. Formal security providers may be present, but lack the operational capacity and authority to do their job. Hence, irregular armed groups often assume policing functions within limited zones, usually in consultation with social leaders and on the basis of customary justice mechanisms. Sometimes such groups collaborate with formal judicial bodies. Outside cities, armed groups guard roads and occasionally perform other services, such as providing security for deliveries of central bank cash, transporting equipment to municipalities, or sweeping sand off otherwise impassable desert roads. Residents sometimes appeal to armed groups to help them tackle public service problems, or to pressure state entities into delivering better services. Yet the services that armed groups render to communities also allow them to justify their presence and generate revenue.

Armed actors do not have a monopoly on agency in the areas under their control, nor do they act independently from the social setting. Sometimes armed actors come under pressure from their home communities to convey broader social demands to the state, such as for better public services, local development projects and jobs. For example, in Ubari, groups of protesters have blockaded the Sharara oil field on several occasions since 2013. Ironically, they have been aided by the very armed actors whose mandate was to protect the facilities. In 2014, this prompted the government to introduce a recruitment plan and set up a technical training institute to build local capacity. Although the security context and actors have since changed, a similar situation occurred in December 2018. Commanders of the Sharara oil guard endorsed the Fezzan Anger Movement and allowed it to enter the facility, prompting the NOC to declare force majeure at the field. In parallel to negotiations with the oil guard, the GNA presented a development fund for the south to appease protesters and their communities. This does not mean that armed groups act selflessly – oil blockades also often involve financial demands by armed groups.

The territorial segmentation of the south can facilitate law enforcement and the creation of ‘safe zones’. Interviewees from across the Fezzan explained that travelling within zones of tribal influence is usually safe, at least for people from those areas. Social means of control and conflict resolution still exist, and armed groups to some extent remain accountable to their communities.

Sebha provides an interesting case study of the achievements and shortcomings of neighbourhood-based security provision. Since 2017, tribal armed groups in different parts of the city have organized what are termed security ‘rooms’ (i.e. command centres), with some coordination at the city level. Given the lack of an overall security body trusted by all the different constituencies – some at war with each other – to deal with security incidents objectively, the system instead relies on each neighbourhood ‘room’ policing its own area, detaining suspects from its tribe(s), and handing over individuals from outside its zone of operations to the relevant entity. This is done in coordination with the Sebha Joint Security Room and, sometimes, judicial authorities. The arrangement is susceptible to tribal bias, allows criminals to be shielded in the community, and offers limited oversight and accountability. Nonetheless, it has facilitated management of security, in particular creating links between armed actors from different tribes while limiting the risk of conflict escalation and tit-for-tat retaliation.

In some cases, tribal armed groups appear to have had a positive impact beyond addressing security threats and crime. Some interviewees for this paper identified Abdelkafi, on the northern edge of Sebha, as a case in point. This predominantly Magarha neighbourhood consists mainly of residential areas and farmland, with little urban infrastructure. In recent years, services and trade have boomed, and businesses have relocated to Abdelkafi from other parts of the city. Stores and workshops have opened, along with commercial bank branches and a local passport office. These developments have largely been enabled by the presence of a neighbourhood battalion, which has executed its security role efficiently.

At the same time, territorial segregation curtails mobility and puts civilians at risk. While southerners tend to feel safe in the areas where they live, many dread travelling to other cities or in some cases even to other neighbourhoods. The risks travellers face range from low-level extortion and harassment at checkpoints to armed robbery, kidnapping for ransom or even identity-based killing (i.e. based on the traveller’s tribal or family affiliation). When tribal factions are at war, civilians may be targeted. Over the past few years in Sebha, it has often been unsafe for people to venture into neighbourhoods dominated by another tribe. This has curtailed access to essential public services. One interviewee recounted that he had not entered central Sebha since 2014 for fear of being identified as Tebu at any of the checkpoints controlled by Awlad Suleiman groups. A Gaddadfa youth activist said that for years members of his community in northern Sebha had been scared of going to the municipal medical centre – located in the south of the city – and that healthcare problems were only alleviated when a clinic opened in their area. Members of the Awlad Suleiman tribe have not been able to travel safely south of Sebha into Tebu-held areas or across the borders into Chad or Niger; this has had a lasting impact on businesses and trade relations. Mobility is especially curtailed for women. Interviewees in Sebha said that women are usually accompanied by male family members even when going to school, work or to run errands. Travel is further complicated by fact that southerners tend to rely on transport by car, including when going to the north or to Tunisia, given that air travel from the south is limited.

Revenue generation and resource mobilization

Southern armed groups exploit their control of territory and strategic facilities to extract rents from the state, to enable (and profit from) illicit trade flows, and sometimes to engage in violent extortion and banditry.

Southern Libya’s economy largely relies on the informal sector, specifically informal trade and smuggling of all sorts. This is in part reflects the socio-economic environment, given a lack of access to higher education or public sector employment and an underdeveloped private sector. While much informal economic activity is not illegal, it largely takes place outside of state oversight. Traders sometimes attempt to fulfil formal requirements – such as business registration, and payment of taxes and customs fees – where necessary, but ignore them where there is no state supervision. Southern cross-border trade takes place in a grey zone: there are no formal customs controls between Libya and neighbouring Chad, Niger, Algeria and, to a lesser extent, Tunisia. The line between formal and informal, legal and illegal, is thus blurred, with economic activity conducted in a space where formal rules are rarely applied, and where official and unofficial security actors exist side by side.

Business practices in southern Libya are structured according to tribal power dynamics. Armed groups discriminate heavily between people of their own tribe and others, for example in terms of who they let pass through checkpoints and at what price.

Business practices in southern Libya are structured according to tribal power dynamics. Armed groups discriminate heavily between people of their own tribe and others, for example in terms of who they let pass through checkpoints and at what price. Merchants mostly prefer to operate in territory where their tribe is dominant, as this makes logistics easier and provides a degree of security. As a result, trade and smuggling routes are segmented. Transportation of merchandise is a multi-step process, in which goods change hands at the boundaries between tribal zones of influence, with different actors taking over at each boundary and transporting goods to the next hand-over point. For instance, fuel smuggled from Zawiya to the south may be handled by three or four different actors or groups of actors, depending on the territory it crosses. The handover process involves the two parties determining a safe location for the exchange of merchandise and payment. For the buyer, a safe location usually means somewhere outside the tribal zone of influence of the seller. As a fuel smuggler in Ubari explained, when buying a large quantity of fuel in Wadi al-Shati, payment is made through an intermediary and the money only disbursed once the vehicle transporting the fuel has left the Magarha tribe’s zone of control and reached Sebha. Fewer precautions are taken for smaller quantities of fuel, which are exchanged at known ‘marketplaces’, such as the small locality of Adiri on the southern edge of Wadi al-Shati, at which retailers can buy or order directly without an intermediary.

Access to state resources

The ability of southern-based armed groups to obtain resources from the central state is more uneven than for their counterparts in the west and east of the country.

Security sector salaries

As Gaddafi-era military structures fell apart in 2011, many southern army members lost their access to salaries. Over subsequent years, salaries were gradually unlocked, on an individual basis or in batches. Some pre-2011 military units remained under the chief of staff, but in most cases army members needed to re-enrol. As the process was often managed through informal connections, this fostered the emergence of clientelist structures. The polarization of national-level governance led rival camps to use the release of salaries for political gain, especially from 2014 onwards. For example, the (now-defunct) Government of National Salvation would place lists of Tuareg army members back on to the payroll to obtain the loyalty of local leaders. The same tactics were employed by the Interim Government and by the LAAF.

Meanwhile, a large number of civilian fighters were included on the public payroll as the armed groups to which they belonged obtained government recognition and mandates. Security sector contracts gave rise to corruption as there was little state control over the registration and revenue distribution processes: ‘Bribes would be paid to interior or defence ministry officials to include certain lists, or intermediaries who helped register the brigade members would receive a share of the salary payments.’ In many instances, armed group members accused their commanders of embezzling state funds destined for salary payments. Such arrangements reportedly continue to affect salary levels in the Fezzan to this day. The usual salary for a member of a government-approved armed group is now around LYD1,500–2,000 per month (in 2012 and 2013 most were only paid LYD500). Those on ‘fake’ lists do not receive full pay, because a share of it is diverted to the interlocutor(s) who facilitated the arrangement. ‘For a young man in Sebha with poor work prospects it’s still preferable to get, say, LYD250 per month than nothing.’ This mechanism has boosted the ranks of armed groups in the Fezzan, but it has also artificially inflated membership numbers, since many of those enlisted are inactive. Over the years, salary payments have not kept up with the proliferation of armed groups and the level of recruitment in the Fezzan. This has left many fighters without steady income, reliant on additional sources of revenue through their group’s territorial and tribal influence.

Budget cuts and the introduction of the national ID number system in 2013 had a major impact in the Fezzan, especially in Sebha and Ubari. Population groups of undetermined legal status who were excluded from the database are also strongly represented in the security sector. Many were regular members of the army and police under the former regime, and later became involved in armed groups that sprung up after 2011. The reform thus left a large number of combatants without pay. According to a former police officer from Ubari:

Many army members from the Sahelian Tuareg left their positions after the national [ID] number was implemented and they stopped getting paid. Battalions ended up with 50 or less members on active duty, and hundreds sitting at home with no revenue. Some ex-army and police became involved in smuggling and robberies, made a living with menial jobs, or left Ubari to find informal work elsewhere.

An administrative number system – introduced in 2014 for state employees who were ineligible for the national ID number – led to salaries being partially restored, yet disbursements continued to suffer from delays and administrative bottlenecks. The frustrations of southern army personnel about having their ranks and salaries frozen aided the LAAF’s subsequent expansion into the region. It was not until mid-2019 that the GNA took decisive measures to address these issues, but its response was widely seen as being too little, too late. It authorized Ali Kanna, as commander of Sebha Military Zone, to make an inventory of military members in the region who had not been getting paid, and to adjust their ranks and salaries based on the aforementioned Decree 441 of 2013. Kanna issued two key decrees to settle these issues, in August and October 2019, which included an annex listing over 2,000 rank-and-file military personnel registered in the zone. An interviewee from Ubari welcomed this long-overdue step, but cautioned that the GNA would be unable to take significant credit for it among the Tuareg community.

Salary disbursements in any event remain arbitrary, reliant on unpredictable security arrangements, and seemingly based on outdated personnel lists. As a political instrument for shoring up alliances, the policy on salaries is thus flawed. Salaries for military members are paid from the General Administration for Military Accounts (GAMA) in Tripoli or from the LAAF’s military accounts department, with contractual payments from the Ministry of Defence being made to armed group commanders based on their membership lists. Money for salaries is allocated to commercial banks, which in turn distribute the funds to their branches depending on where the recipients’ accounts are located. Although salary disbursements in recent years have frequently been delayed by logistical problems, the situation has improved since the LAAF asserted its authority in Sebha in January 2019. Throughout 2019 there were regular deliveries of cash from both the CBL in Tripoli and the eastern CBL. The disbursement of security sector salaries to the Fezzan has thus become more reliable.

However, the existence of two rival leaderships for Sebha Military Zone has caused administrative chaos. The Tripoli war has led the GNA to try to block salary payments to pro-LAAF groups. As a result of cash being delivered from the east, some army personnel in the Fezzan may have received duplicate salaries during the first months of 2019 or LAAF war bonuses on top of their GNA-approved salaries. The GNA thus instructed the GAMA’s southern branch and Ali Kanna’s Sebha Military Zone to review the database of army personnel units and to block the salaries of those paid from the east, according to official correspondence dated July 2019. In order to receive their salaries and wartime bonuses through the GAMA, army members are allegedly required to confirm in writing that they are not ‘communicating with Operation Dignity [LAAF general command] nor will accept any future payments from it’. It is unclear to what extent these measures have been implemented.

While the evident administrative confusion resulting from the institutional divide between east and west renders it difficult to trace payments and assess which groups in the south are currently paid by whom, what partial information is available indicates that commanders have been taking advantage of multiple financial channels. For example, the GNA has authorized salary and war bonus payments to some groups aligned with the LAAF. According to different explanations put forth by interviewees, this is either because the GNA has not yet fully implemented steps to suspend payments to these groups, because groups are split into pro-GNA and pro-LAAF factions, or because pro-GNA commanders are pretending to have more men under their command than they really do. As one interviewee in Sebha said:

The vast majority of military cadres in the Fezzan support the LAAF. There are a few commanders here and there who will tell the GNA that they, and however many of their soldiers, support it. So the GNA releases pay for them. They will happily receive pay but at the same time might receive pay from the east. They may be present in a given location but play no actual role on the ground. It’s just ‘salaries in the pocket’.

Control of public facilities

One major avenue for armed groups to access state resources is through physical control of critical infrastructure, both military and civilian. Oil and gas facilities are of particular value because they give local armed actors and communities leverage over the government. The Sharara, al-Fil and Wafa oil and gas fields were among the first locations in the Fezzan to be seized by anti-regime fighters in 2011. Although the fields are nominally under the authority of the NOC and the Ministry of Defence’s Petroleum Facilities Guard (PFG), they are effectively guarded by local armed groups. As a result, oil facilities have been the object of fierce competition between rival groups.

When groups are unable to obtain state recognition, or their salaries do not materialize, they can become a liability. Multiple production shutdowns at the southern oil fields have illustrated this. Armed groups also exploit their leverage over other public facilities. For example, Sebha’s Court of First Instance was briefly shut down by the armed group that claimed to guard the building, after it had failed to obtain state recognition and salaries. By demonstrating their ability to disrupt vital state facilities, armed groups are often able to obtain government concessions. Such blackmail can involve a broader range of local actors and social demands.

Refineries and fuel storage sites offer an additional source of ready income for armed groups that oil fields do not. In the southeast, the Martyr Ahmed al-Sharif Battalion (Battalion 306) guards the Sarir refinery and oil depot, where by all accounts it is heavily implicated in fuel smuggling. In the Fezzan, the Sebha oil depot is an especially lucrative asset for any armed group guarding it, as a substantial amount of the fuel there is sold on the black market, in exchange for bribes to employees and guards. Battalion 160, which had previously guarded the facility for years on government mandates, is widely considered to have enabled illegal fuel sales. Confronted with popular outrage, the battalion has tried to polish its image by publicizing its anti-smuggling interventions; it even set up a so-called Committee to Combat Fuel Smuggling in 2017. When the LAAF claimed control of Sebha in January 2019, Battalion 160 was removed from the depot and replaced with Battalion 116, which has stronger ties to the LAAF. Smuggling did not stop, however, and even Battalion 160 allegedly still profiteers through ‘ghost’ fuel stations run by members of the group. Fezzan smuggling practices and networks overall do not appear to have been significantly affected by the LAAF’s campaign in the south, notwithstanding fuel shortages associated with the conflict in western Libya since April 2019. A Qatrun fuel smuggler interviewed in late March 2019 said that for him little had changed: ‘Yes, we now need to deal with new actors. But [in fact] they are the same old actors, except they now wear the uniforms of Haftar’s army …’

‘Yes, we now need to deal with new actors. But [in fact] they are the same old actors, except they now wear the uniforms of Haftar’s army …’

‘Taxation’

In southern cities, some armed groups ‘tax’ businesses in return for providing protection or turning a blind eye to illicit activity. Some levy similar informal charges on public institutions such as banks located in the areas under their control. Failure to accept an offer of protection may lead the armed group to deliberately create security problems that then render its services indispensable. Protection rackets appear less common in the south than in the north, primarily because there are fewer businesses, at least legal ones, to protect or extort money from.

On the other hand, illicit businesses, such as running transit houses for migrants, are a good source of revenue for armed groups, in particular in Sebha. In small towns with a greater degree of social cohesion there are less opportunities for racketeering. Talking about the currency exchange and transfer shops in Qatrun, a local explained: ‘They don’t need to pay protection money to any militia. Qatrun is a village, everybody knows everybody, and if anything happens you can find the culprits easily.’

While most Libyan armed groups do not directly engage in human smuggling, many demand payment to allow non-Libyan smugglers to operate in their areas and properties. Some agreements are explicit, while others are deliberately informal in order to obscure the Libyan involvement. A well-established smuggler in Sebha told one of the authors of this paper that he had moved his operational base from one part of the city to another in order to strike a deal with a more powerful tribe. In return for the tribe’s protection, he agreed to provide a share of the profits of the business.

In some southern towns, municipal authorities have begun taxing businesses through local police forces or armed groups in order to supplement municipal budgets. Such practices are not state-sanctioned and do not follow any official guidelines. For instance, the municipality of Kufra has long generated tax revenue from road tolls on merchants and car dealers; the main group enforcing this regime is the Subul al-Salam Brigade. The security directorate of Qatrun imposes a tax on foreign businesses, such as Mauritanian merchants and retailers. As a local explained, this tax is presented as optional but that is only nominally the case: ‘Nobody will force them to pay the tax, but if they don’t have police protection nobody will intervene if they get shoplifted and lose their merchandise.’ In a context of financial and governance crises and municipal councils having to run on tight budgets, informal taxation may be seen as a valid coping strategy. However, it also opens the door for abuse of authority, as armed groups can collect tolls and business taxes almost at whim, sometimes with the endorsement of local officials.

Outside urban areas, road tolls are the most straightforward source of income for armed groups. It is nearly impossible to move goods through southern Libya without paying tolls, whether travel is by paved road or desert track. Tolls are usually collected at checkpoints by armed groups that control the adjoining sections of road. These groups mostly have a permanent presence in these locations, and sometimes official security mandates. Thus, travellers can know in advance where they will pass through checkpoints and which actors they will encounter. Checkpoint locations sometimes change hands, and groups that are not generally in control of a road section may appear spontaneously.

Outside urban areas, road tolls are the most straightforward source of income for armed groups. It is nearly impossible to move goods through southern Libya without paying tolls.

The number of checkpoints in the south has increased significantly in recent years. For example, the road connecting Sebha to northern Libya is heavily controlled by armed groups. Interviewees noted a visible increase in the number of checkpoints between Sebha and Mizda via Shweirif in late 2018. Also in late 2018, travellers complained that a trip from Sebha to Tripoli by road took at least twice as long as it had before (14+ hours instead of seven or eight hours). Over the course of the 2019 South Liberation and Purge Operation in the Fezzan, LAAF forces demolished checkpoints 17 and 18, south of Sebha, which had been held by Tebu groups widely criticized for demanding tolls and harassing travellers. However, most checkpoints in Tebu-controlled areas south and southeast of Sebha have remained in place.

According to a fuel smuggler from Qatrun, in December 2018 there were 18 checkpoints between Sebha and al-Tum (a checkpoint at the Libya–Niger border). The roughly 320-km-long road section from Qatrun to al-Tum is controlled by two Tebu armed groups (Desert Shield Battalion and Umm al-Aranib Martyrs Battalion), each of which operates several checkpoints. For these and other armed groups present in the border zones, collecting tolls is more complicated once paved roads end, as is the case between Qatrun and the gold mine of Kuri Bugidi at the border with Chad, or in the southwestern border triangle between Libya, Niger and Algeria (the so-called Salvador Pass). In these areas, armed groups set up position at bottlenecks that cross-border transporters cannot avoid. Cross-border merchants and smugglers sometimes may also pay armed groups in advance, to avoid complications on their journeys. At the border crossing of al-Tum, Tebu forces register the entry and exit of vehicles and charge ‘customs fees’ for merchandise. This occurs without any official oversight, as there is no system in place for immigration and customs control. Every day, according to a January 2018 report, an average of 150 vehicles transit through al-Tum. Once merchants and smugglers have crossed the border into Niger, they also need to pay off government forces there.

Merchants are taxed according to both their ethnicity/tribal affiliation and the nature of their merchandise. Within these categories, rates tend to be the same or very similar across the southern region. Interviewees described rates as ‘fixed’ or ‘commonly agreed upon’. As fuel and cooking gas smugglers noted, predictable rates are good for business. ‘Every checkpoint has a known rate and this way trust is built between the smugglers and the armed groups,’ said a Qatrun-based fuel smuggler. Traders who share the same tribal affiliation as those running checkpoints and who are acquainted with them may be let through at a discounted rate or for free. In comparison, traders who are of a different tribe from that of the armed group have little leeway to refuse or negotiate, and armed groups often exploit this vulnerability to charge high rates. For example, Tebu armed groups systematically discriminate against non-Tebu merchants, offering special rates for Tebu merchants and smugglers, even if they are not acquainted and not from the same local community.

Illicit goods offer a significant opportunity for taxation. Interviews with smugglers indicated that the large profits to be obtained from taxing illicit fuel shipments have apparently motivated more armed groups to set up checkpoints. Interestingly, in many cases a veneer of legality appears important to armed actors operating the checkpoints even where they have no official mandate. Interviews with human smugglers indicated that the cost of moving migrants varies significantly depending on the nationality of the migrants and whether they hold Libyan residency permits. One smuggler told one of the authors in December 2018 that the cost of a taxi for an undocumented migrant to reach Tripoli from Sebha was LYD700, whereas the cost for a migrant with a residency permit was LYD100. While the drivers doubtless inflate prices for undocumented migrants, a significant proportion of the higher cost is likely to be due to the difference in checkpoint taxes.

Crime has skyrocketed in the south in recent years and has become a revenue stream for armed groups. It is likely that criminal acts by armed groups are more frequent than commonly assumed, because many incidents are not investigated. Common crimes include theft, robbery, carjackings and kidnapping for ransom. A distinction is usually made between armed groups (‘legitimate’) and bandits/outlaws (‘illegitimate’). To some extent the difference lies in the eyes of the beholder, although the bandit designation usually refers to foreign armed groups (Sudanese, Chadian, Nigerien). For example, the Tebu armed groups present along the road south of Qatrun have denounced ‘illegal checkpoints’ that were set up by a Tebu group from Niger. Foreign actors are, however, not subject to social pressure in the same way as are Libyan actors, and are hence more likely to engage in ‘rogue’ behaviour, such as seizing merchandise or vehicles, or extorting money from travellers. Over the past year, an increase in roadside robberies and kidnappings for ransom has been reported in the area between Ubari and Ghat. To cross from Niger into Libya, traders of illegal merchandise such as drugs also use the Salvador Pass – this mountain area is known to be particularly dangerous due to its challenging topography and the presence of criminal gangs and extremists (Tuareg and other). Traders have to be prepared to pay off or defend themselves against roaming gangs.

Some southern armed groups engage in more sophisticated forms of criminal activity, although this is rare compared to in the north. For example, interviewees said that some Sebha groups had inflated security or catering contracts in recent years, and that some influential security actors had profited from business partnerships to siphon off public funds disbursed by the GNA or the Interim Government for projects and services in the Fezzan.

Engagement in economic activity at different levels within the group

In the south, the redistribution of revenues outside the salary payments system varies according to the individual practice of each group’s leadership, the relations between its members and the type of revenue involved. For instance, road toll revenues cannot realistically be captured by commanders without a fair share being allocated to low-ranking members. Some Tebu armed groups, such as the Desert Shield Battalion, have set up money collection and distribution mechanisms that emulate formal salary systems, thus offering their members a certain degree of income stability. Revenues from road tolls and smuggling profits are centrally collected by the group. At the end of the month, each member gets a ‘salary’; the rest goes to the group leaders. This allows revenue collection to be controlled, rather than relying on arbitrary formulas or on the ‘whoever is at the checkpoint takes all’ rule. By contrast, revenue distribution is less transparent within certain armed groups involved in more sophisticated revenue-generation schemes; these benefit armed group leaders and their business partners without necessarily creating income for rank-and-file members.