Libya: What About The South?

The situation on the ground in southern Libya is largely unknown but any new government will have to tame this wild expanse

By Alex Warren

A Libyan boy with a herd of goats near Ghadames, which has reportedly been under siege since the conflict began. Photograph: John Moore/AP

Some 400 miles south of Tripoli, the city of Sebha is a sprawling mess of low-lying houses, dusty roads and half-finished construction projects in the heart of Libya's Fezzan region. In the middle of a small roundabout, framed by a low green fence, is a one-room cabin called Dar Muammar that was briefly home to the future leader of Libya before he was expelled from the local school.

Faded billboards recreate scenes of Gaddafi in a desert tent, planning the restructuring of Libya into a jamahiriya and "the era of the masses" that he announced from Sebha in 1977. Looming menacingly above the city, whose population has soared in the past few years to more than 250,000, is an Italian-built fort that became a symbol of power in one of the regime's most important strongholds, and one which appears to remain in the control of Gaddafi loyalists.

Throughout this Libya conflict, attention has understandably been focused on populous coastal cities such as Tripoli, Misurata and Benghazi. The south, in contrast, has been a virtual black hole of information, with few verifiable reports about the situation on the ground. But taming this wild expanse of desert and rocky plains – which covers an area larger than France and Spain combined – will be increasingly vital for any new government claiming to control Libya.

This is not least because of the region's natural resources. Lying west of Sebha is a fertile zone called the Wadi al Hayat – the Valley of Life – which contains some of Libya's most important oil and water reserves. An oilfield operated here by Spain's Repsol accounted alone for more than 15% of Libya's pre-conflict crude production, while other energy firms are also active in the area. Deep underground aquifers in southern Libya supply water to the Great Man-Made River – perhaps one of the few achievements of the Gaddafi regime that will outlive it – that in turn provides about two-thirds of the country's water supply.

Security is also a crucial consideration. Even before the uprising, parts of the south were close to being lawless. Huge swathes of uninhabited desert between the towns of Ghadames and Ghat were frequently off-limits to travellers because of clashes with militants or bandits infiltrating across the Algerian border. Ghat itself, a garrison town close to the border with Chad and Niger and a world away from Tripoli, has in recent years seen shootouts between al-Qaida-linked fighters and Libyan security forces.

In the extreme central-south, which has no paved roads or mobile phone network, are remnants of Libya's border war with Chad in the 1970s and 1980s which has left many areas heavily landmined. In the deep south-east, the town of Al Kufra has a history of rejecting centralised control from Tripoli. A rebellion by the local Tubu tribe in 2009 was only quelled after the security forces sent in helicopter gunships. Around the town are the skeletal remains of second world war tanks and aircraft, a reminder of previous battles waged over this patch of north African desert.

Ghadames, home to a Unesco world heritage site and one side of a three-way border with Algeria and Tunisia, has reportedly been under siege since the conflict began, with pro-Gaddafi soldiers joining forces with Tuareg tribesmen and fighters from nearby towns that have historically been antagonistic towards Ghadames.

Illegal immigration is an even bigger issue. Sometimes aided and abetted by corrupt police or human traffickers, thousands of sub-Saharan African nationals filter every year across Libya's porous borders with Sudan, Niger or Chad and make their way northwards to the Mediterranean.

Six months of fighting might have discouraged all but the most motivated of these migrants, but peace will bring renewed immigration problems not just for the new transitional authorities but also for the EU, which had managed to reduce the number of immigrants reaching Italy from Libya from 32,500 in 2008 to 7,300 in 2009 after closer co-operation with the Libyan authorities.

It is almost impossible to ascertain the real situation in the south, and recent events in Tripoli have shown the danger of jumping to conclusions about who controls what in Libya. On Monday, the transitional council's chairman, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, admitted in a press conference that Sebha was still not under its control, while there are even rumours that Gaddafi has moved the Central Bank's gold reserves to the desert city. Other reports suggest there are serious food shortages and large numbers of stranded migrants across the region.

It is equally difficult to predict how pro-Gaddafi elements in the south might react when, or if, their leader and his sons are captured or killed. They could melt away and quickly switch allegiance to the transitional council, but they might also be inclined to fight for their turf.

Opinions vary about the actual importance of Libya's tribal and regional affiliations, but they will almost certainly be stronger in the south than in other parts of the country, especially as it contains a more diverse mix of ethnic groups and nationalities which includes the Amazigh, Tubu and Tuareg, as well as large numbers of nationals from Chad, Niger and Sudan.

Deep-seated distrust and old feuds may well violently rear their heads in the collapse of any remaining law and order in the coming weeks, while the abundance of weapons now circulating throughout the country also bodes ill. Whoever wins the battle for Tripoli has not necessarily won the war for Libya.

-This commentary was published in The Guardian on 24/08/2011
- Alex Warren is a director of a Middle East research and advisory firm, Frontier and has worked extensively throughout Libya since 2008. He has written and presented widely on the country