 Good afternoon everybody and welcome to this event. It's a great pleasure for me to introduce Fred wary and Layla book. I guess Fred's book is really a remarkable book. I think I'm I've reported some on Libya, but not nearly as much as as as Fred has It's a book that is an incredibly rich book. It contains multiple stories. It contains the story of what happened in the 2011 revolt The story about what happened to Chris Stevens It talks about the whole story of Isis in Libya and then of course the refugees that passed through Libya and then the story of Haftar the Libyan strongman who may be May be Passing under history. We'd soon we don't know anyway each one of these I think could be the subject of a book and This book is full of amazing reporting which took considerable courage to Who to do and and it's beautifully written as well We're fortunate to have here also with a slated book. I guess who's the CEO and deputy director general of the Benghazi Medical Center, right? former sorry who has done lots of medical brave medical work in Libya Member of the scientific committee for reproductive health of Libya that also former well That was when I was in Libya. Yes, okay. Yeah and Continues to do human rights work And she also can tell us I think about her experience there in particularly in Benghazi where she did extremely brave work I want to start off just by asking Fred what led you to write this book? Great. Well, thank you all for coming. Thank you Robert for moderating Thank you, especially the dr. Layla given her her role in a lot of the events in the book and her especially her role in the life of Benghazi You know my my purpose in this book. I think was was really to try to correct An impression in the American public consciousness that Libya's you know history sort of ended in 2011 or 2012 that you had this narrative that the intervention Destroyed Libya the revolution failed and what followed was was simply chaos What I argue is is you know Libyans are still working out their political destiny as the subtitle the book Suggest there is a battle for Libya right now. There's an ongoing struggle. So I try to give Libyans Agency, I think there's a contest of different visions of political order for this country The first vision was a democratic civic vision This was the the motive for the first protests at the Benghazi courthouse on February 17th and that vision expressed itself in 2012 with the elections For for the General National Congress The question is why has that vision proven so hard? To implement there were a number of other visions. There were regionalist visions the Federalist visions There was a vision that looked to the past with the monarchist There was unfortunately an exclusionary vision with the architects of the political isolation law There were ideological vision visions from the jihadists You had certain visions that were centered around particular towns and their supremacy and later on you had an authoritarian militarist Vision vision for the country and and I think today unfortunately you have people that don't have any vision at all that are frankly motivated purely by Political power and by profit as a UN report just made clear So I'm trying to tell this story of of Libya's politics unpack the politics to show That the the unraveling of the country was not preordained after 2011 that there were a number of of steps taken There were missed opportunities. There were mistakes by both Libyans and the international community The second purpose of the book is to move from the abstract to the personal and to sort of humanize Libya's story by profiling obviously the key Political players, but more importantly ordinary Libyans the activists who first Gathered at the courthouse what became of them many were exiled some murdered some found themselves aren't opposing sides Of a civil war the young Libyans who get caught up in militias. Why do they join? a Libyan who joins The Islamic State what's his you know motivation? I want to take readers also to communities that have been long You know neglected the taboo and the Torah the ethno linguistic minorities in the south who after the revolution were cooperating But then unfortunately fought each other in the town of of Ubar And so this is just meant to sort of convey the stories of Libyans who were caught up in the turmoil and also non-Libyans the migrants who traversed Libya's territory looking for a better life and unfortunately suffered untold abuses in these detention centers Which is one of the great moral tragedies of our time and the third purpose is to really Sort of do a post-mortem on American policy and international policy in Libya the decision To intervene in this country is well known But I think the real story is is the first year after Gaddafi's fall when the Obama administration Really abdicated the responsibility for nation-building for any follow-up to the United Nations To the Europeans who then in turn Said the Libyans own this and so I have a section in my book That's called no ownership and nobody wanted to own this of course the Libyans needed to own this But unfortunately they inherited from Gaddafi a System of governance that really didn't leave them with the skill to do that So I think there were a number of of international missteps in the first year The sort of rush to elections the failure by the United Nations to deal with the security sector and then of course The tragic attack of Benghazi which I which I reconstruct using court records or interviews with Libyans on the ground The war in the Beltway is well known, but I think the real effect Was felt in the city itself and what did that attack do to America's? Presence in in Benghazi to America's presence in the country It really constrained it by the time the Obama administration What wanted to re-engage in Libya in 2013? I think it was it was too late They had an ill-fated effort to try to train in Libyan army So I think there are multiple lessons from this episode for for American foreign policy I Just want to briefly pick up on what you said This is much more than a book of political analysis that there are a number of I think really unforgettable portraits of people in this book including Salwa book I guess the human rights lawyer who did incredibly Brave work and paid with her life for it incidentally. She's the cousin of Dr. Layla with us here today and Let me just then turn to you and ask you to talk a little bit about Benghazi because in 2011 when the Libyan revolt took place shortly after the drama of Chakri Square and Cairo Suddenly all the attention was focused on Benghazi the first city in Libya to liberate itself from Qaddafi I was one of the many many reporters who showed up at that time in February to this town that was undergoing this kind of Wild sense of you know ecstatic celebration having having fought this very brief, but very bloody Conflict you're from Benghazi. Tell us what was it like at that time? And then can you take us a little bit forward as well? After all there was quite a What relatively long period let's say when things seemed Positive for Libya when there still seemed the chance that you know Some of the other countries that of the of the Arab uprisings were beginning to go south things were starting to turn violent But in 2011 and 12 there was still a lot of hope for Libya Can you talk us about tell us first about Benghazi what would he's like to be there at that time and then How things gradually began to get worse up to the death of Chris Steven Thank you, Robert. Thank you Fred and thank you Thanks also to Carnegie for hosting me and thank you for inviting me to this event actually Reading the book has really been a sentimental journey for me because it did take me from the Qaddafi days where Coming from Benghazi There are so many stories to tell about a very long period of an oppressive tyrant regime especially in Cities like Benghazi and Derna where a lot of his oppression was focused And then the book takes us from the you know the era of Qaddafi and dismantling again You know of the state where at one point Fred says in his book that by 1990 Libya was in ruins Which is quite true and then takes us to the revolution days and you know the feelings that we had in February 2011 on On the 15th of February 2011 there was shock the The youth and the women who started this whole you know the incident that started this whole uprising on that day and the stories that the youth and Obviously many of them are our family and relatives and friends and neighbors and people of Benghazi They couldn't believe what was happening So I can say that one one of them said that and he told me this actually he said He had he's getting bold He was he's 32 years old and he's getting a bit bold and he said my knees were shaking And I felt a few hairs left on my head were gonna fall down because I couldn't believe that we were actually marching in Benghazi and Saying we want you know the regime to to fall we want you know get Daffy out so People waited for this. They wanted it so people were desperate, you know 43 years of Dispiration but the people of Libya. I mean this is a story about people who and the country that that has historically been you know Exposed to decades of occupation and terror tyranny and so the people were desperate for change They wanted liberty. They wanted their rights. They wanted freedom. They wanted justice social justice and just and justice of all types They wanted their rights citizenship and human rights So it was a very big event and our feelings. I can't I mean until today We all remember those feelings of that February. We cannot forget them. We felt this euphoria this string this power we felt that we have ownership finally we may be getting our country back So it was a fantastic feeling and it was a popular uprising at that point, you know regardless of you know a lot of What we hear and a lot of what we read about today But it was at that time a popular uprising in Benghazi all of the people marched in the streets during the first days of the uprising and in five days the whole Most of Eastern Libya was actually freed from get Daffy's regime, which was a shock to everyone. You know it was really shocking so So I think that you know what happened after that is that this euphoria this feeling of Ownership this happiness Stuck us and we thought that finally You know we can work hard and then rebuild our country and rebuild the institutions and reform things and you know reform the educational system the health care the you know judicial system the Politics and women and youth were empowered. They had ownership. They were you know There was civil society for the first time in Libya. We never had civil society before the only Two or three organizations, you know had to be affiliated with the previous regime and their You know the sons and and daughter of Gaddafi So for the first time civil society for the first time people are working hard to build something from nothing Then you know things Started to change obviously and one of the things that I really like about Fritz book is that he touches and all of these issues, you know, he shows the the human side of the Libya conflict because nowadays all we know and read about Libya is armed conflict his militia is Isis is terrorism is really is migrant, you know problems and refugees and but there is another side the majority of the Libyan people the silent majority are not Involved in all of this conflict and and you know politics and what's happening. They're actually suffering Silently, they're the ones that You know did this, you know that that participated in this popular uprising to have some rights and to have their freedom and liberty But you know things didn't work. Well, I can't say as as you mentioned that the revolution failed though because I mean revolutions You know, they they're unpredictable and the outcomes usually can only be, you know, analyzed properly many years later, you know So Usually revolutions they change if they change the regime then they have succeeded But what comes after the revolution, you know is unpredictable as well. So maybe you know Um Anyway, so so in the book actually then Fred goes on to talk about how the people of this euphoria and how the dream of the Libyan people started but then something went wrong and By the end of 2011, I mean in Benghazi Benghazi was a hub Everybody came to Benghazi in 2011 everyone people left Tripoli through Tunisia and came to Benghazi Because the regime was still there in Tripoli. So they couldn't they didn't have a voice there Everybody suddenly had a voice every single Libyan Libyans never had a voice before they could never speak Everybody had a voice and everybody participated in something So it was like being Gaddafi had put a veil on Libya The veil was removed and suddenly you have all of these people trying to do something and trying to talk So all of the international community came to Benghazi the organizations the United Nations the Ambassadors the diplomatic missions the presidents, I mean, you know The British Prime Minister the you know macro Sarkozy in 2011 and So it was really a hub, you know, and I remember that we used to stay out till 1 a.m. Working You know because we were so excited about this new era that was going to come but then little by little things started to change and by the end of 2011 we started seeing some you know Violence And then in 2012, you know and Fred mentions in the book how you know incidents started to happen attacks on the international missions on the Red Cross on the British Mission on actually even the French Mission it was you know acts of violence has started to occur and We were too busy still in this, you know working hard and thinking that we are going to rebuild this new modern civil Just Libya, you know, and we are going to have a democratic Libya finally So we were too busy to look, you know Thoroughly and see what was going on and The other problem is that and and this is also another thing that Fred mentions in the book Which is very important the international community helped us to win our you know to gain You know what we gained in the revolution They helped us to topple the regime, but the next day they abandoned us And we are a country that has no experience. We were not allowed to participate in politics We were not allowed to have civil society not only that our ministries and our Institutions were dismantled by Gaddafi and also I used to call the ministries during the Gaddafi regime the eggshell ministries There they were you know, they were really nothing just a person a man Who is appointed by Gaddafi and it was a one-man show, but inside there was nothing We had no governance no real laws no real You know Organization inside those institutes so we were people of no experience really and we were left alone so You know Everybody came and I think the proxy started Right then there was a lot of meddling in Libya and and then things started getting out of hand and We came to this You know horrible day where one day Chris Stevens was tragically You know he tragically died in this incident in Benghazi and Things really changed since then After a couple of weeks, I remember we went out in the streets of Benghazi thousands of people. It was the biggest March in Benghazi since the revolution days and we called for the end of violence for the end of militias for Getting back, you know the the civil work that started But things again ended badly on that day and From then on we started having more violence and more meddling and we started seeing a lot of changes Militization of of everything, you know started happening and suddenly the whole country was led by you know armed groups everywhere in Tripoli in Benghazi and CERT and everywhere in Darna and We started losing little by little this these voices, you know the voice that we gained and there was then this surge of attacking the civil activists Musmari and then you know Many of the civil activists started being assassinated in Benghazi in Darna and Sabha in Tripoli and This led then to the 2014 Conflict that you know at the start of the war in Benghazi in May 2014 and In in June we thought the elections. I mean the elections. I think that you also mentioned that in the book, which is something really So I think Fred mentions everything really He's really a you know, he really shows that he I mean this the work of seven years, you know in this book You know is very clearly, you know a lot of on the ground experience and Good my real real knowledge of what was going on in Libya because The elections that happened in 2012 were a bit too early. We have to admit that we were not ready for democracy yet We were not aware of what happened and that's why in 2012 the elections were manipulated Because who won the elections did not really Get the leadership up to that. So we killed democracy right then But then we wanted to have another election So maybe to fix the first election, but it didn't work out and that day of election another tragedy happened and and the death of my first cousin Selva and tragically I was involved I was leading the second largest hospital in Libya in Benghazi and Every time, you know when Chris died he was brought to the Benghazi Medical Center Selva died she was brought to the Benghazi Medical Center and In between them there was a lot of dead bodies a lot of missing people The Benghazi Medical Center had the only forensic medicine and morgue in town So everybody was brought there and it was horrible because you know the This I remember very well this Man who used to come every day to check on his brother in the morgue Every time he hears a missing, you know some unidentified body is brought He comes to see if it's his brother and then he leaves every day and One day he you know, I saw him by chance and I knew About him and I knew him and I saw that in his face that again, you know He saw someone in the morgue and it wasn't his brother So I wanted to console him and support him and he told me, you know, I wish it was him because I want a closure I am tired of coming every day to look at dead people and I'm tired of thinking of my brother although he said I wanted him to be alive, but You know at this point of time, even if he's dead that would be fine for me. I want a closure Same thing happened after Selva's death. I saw him with missing her husband And his sister would be calling me every day in the hospital and asking me Laila in the news It was horrible. We went through very sad terrible times. It was draining. It was painful And Obviously what was going on on the political You know and which Fred explains very well in his book is the big vacuum Which allowed for everybody to come and to you know Open the door for organized crime for trafficking for Struggle, you know power struggles For control by different types of militias for terrorism for extremists I mean Libya became, you know a haven for all kinds and sorts of of things that We never expected, you know to to see or happen in our country because There is a bit of a mention of the beautiful history of Libya, you know that goes to 12,000 years ago With the Phoenicians with the Greeks with the Italians 2,000 kilometers of beautiful Version almost version Mediterranean shore one of the cleanest shores, you know what the Mediterranean Beautiful ruins Roman and Greek and beautiful desert and a lot of resources We are a very rich country with very poor people Gaddafi managed to loot the country over 43 years and I was reading this book the other day about called the looting machine By Tom Burgess and he was talking about the looting of the African nations The sub Saharan African nations and I thought he was talking about Libya, too You know, this is why I think the Sun Salami changed his word corruption to Prediction, you know Because it's extreme. So this is really what you know, this is really What's happening in Libya and this is what also is you know written I've quoted a lot of things here But I really don't have to go back to them because I think I've mentioned them while I was saying So the book really captures the dilemma we are in as Libyans But also captures the dilemma of the international community in dealing with Libya and it capture and it also you know talks about the failures the failures of Libyan leadership To get the country out of this mess But also the failure of the international community to support us and to stop the proxy war Which is one of the most important things, you know, that's really Going on in Libya. I mean countries are fighting their wars in Libya and The Libyan people are suffering Fred I want to bring it back briefly to the Political picture and ask you At some point of you took hold I think in the West about Libya It I think probably a couple of years maybe several years after the kind of fatalistic Review took hold that what happened in the beginning in 2011 with the NATO intervention and that eight-month bloody conflict really kind of that set the course and that that the Fragmentation of the country who was inevitable at that point now as you say nothing was set in stone here But I do wonder if you could talk about missed opportunities in that period because I I think a lot of people have this idea that Perhaps there could have been a different course taken that perhaps, you know You might have avoided all that war if there had been some possibility of a diplomatic compromise with Gaddafi or maybe not But and if and are there other possibly, you know missed opportunities in that first period And if you could also talk a bit about and then maybe one of the reasons this didn't happen Was the role of regional powers like Egypt in particular and and later the United Arab Emirates and And cutter. Yeah, well, they play I mean these sorts of counterfactuals. I mean look could a diplomatic Solution had been reached. I mean the the US diplomats that I interviewed that were on the receiving end of these proposals You know from the regime none of them seemed genuine the Speech by Saif al-Islam on on February 20th. I think really crystallized this notion that the regime was in it for you know its survival The argument that was made for me to me was there was no status cool auntie to return to that once Okay, maybe he had suppressed Benghazi, but then there was still this this uprising or there was still that bubbling and Maybe the Arab powers would have gone in anyway. So there's all sorts of scenarios. We could have worked through the real I mean the missed opportunities. I think during the revolution the The role of of I mean European states and regional states in Arming different militias that then later became the key players in the struggle for Tripoli and especially the quickness of the fall For Tripoli and where there was no coherent plan for securing The city there were competing plans, you know by the Qataris and the Emirati So that regional rivalry I think played a huge role early in the revolution I mean, but the biggest missed opportunity I think was was one of willpower where the Americans Had multiple assessments and multiple plans about what would happen and many of them were optimistic I mean they thought that this country had oil reserves that it was you know, the infrastructure was intact So it would be a quick recovery But you know as one as one experienced foreign service officer told me he said you know, this wasn't our first rodeo We'd done these things before like in Afghanistan in Iraq You know, we should have so the failure wasn't one of anticipation. It was one of will you know to actually Have a presence and to do something on the ground I think there was an over optimism about elections The literature on post-conflict States suggests when you rush to elections, there's a strong risk of a return to conflict in states that don't have a Culture of consensus in the you know the foundation for democracy and I you know, I asked one senior policymaker I mean did anyone try to put the brakes on this and the answer was you know, the Libyans are owning this We're not we're not running a protectorate and so everybody was moving toward these Elections and it was possible in those early, you know months to be guardedly optimistic. I mean the oil rebounded There were militias, but the voting was going on and so there was this You know just sense of of a rush to elections and then you know once those elections happened it was sort of like We've done our job here now. We've got these other crises Syria Ukraine and so Mist opportunities. I mean there you know the the issue of the UN presence perhaps some limited Stabilization force the way the Libyan government the transitional council and then the Libyan government started spending money Early on I mean especially the payments to the militias these were all things that and again It gets to this philosophical question about how much oversight and an authority should the u.s. Or internationals have over Libyans who you know, it's a noble cause let Libyans decide it But but Libyans, you know, we're not equipped to to decide it Yeah, and that question of disarming seems a central one to me as you say Was there anybody who had the authority the moral work of God knows political authority to disarm them after coffee's death I'm reminded of this this anecdote where there was a transitional council member in Benghazi who told Chris Stevens. He said, you know these these young men that are carrying weapons. There are sons They'll they'll disarm and we tell them, you know, and he was he Chris was immediately suspicious And of course the problem is you know, you had the real revolutionaries who fought Gaddafi But then in that first year you had the mushrooming of the militias because the government Started paying salaries to militias at the end of 2011 which created this this genie And so some militias you could argue, you know did play a role in protecting their communities But others became predatory they they evolved on their own logic. They started advancing their their political interests and so the question of disarming and demobilization was never Fully addressed it wasn't simply a question of more jobs or though that was important You know, how do you get these young men out of the militias when they're getting an income when they have this identity? But it was also one of of political trust. I mean the different factions the two towns that were grappling over over Tripoli Miss Rada and Zintan used their militias to project their influence You had the growth of Islamist militias and so quickly it became this this problem that no one has been able to deal with You think I don't want to get make you go into deeply about this, but I'm just curious you think That if the United States or let's say the European countries had in fact decided to create some kind of Protecture it to guide Libya a little more firmly. Would there have been a armed uprising against it? These are always issues. I mean this is this is I mean the Libyans were you know adamant about not having a An occupation force, I mean they did not want boots on the ground and they were they were always divided I think about how much assistance they wanted and so no, I mean these this is a valid a valid point before we go to questions from The audience just wanted to briefly touch on the question of hip-tar as we all know from the newspapers. He's not well There's the possibility of some kind of transition Talk about that. What does it mean and what's what's happening on the ground as people take that news in? Right, right. Well, I mean when I when I first interviewed him in June 2014. It was clear that that he was He was leading a coalition of interests that had aligned behind him for their own specific purposes and you know different tribes federalist security men Disaffected, you know military units and so from the beginning It was much more divided than people, you know realized and and the East Eastern Libya is a diverse place with different centers of power with different tribes And so you've you know in the last months you even before his illness. I think you started having that You know that coalition start to fracture especially after he presented the the you know liberation of Benghazi You know tribes were asking look we supported you in this we're not getting what we wanted There were there were jostling there were competition between different centers of power. I Mean the big question is is this gonna hold together in his absence a number of figures have been put forward to command The Libyan National Army, but that's only you know part of the equation I think you're gonna see the East sort of really open up, you know as a place of contestation Between people in the LNA between different tribes There was this notion that it was all, you know under his control, which was always somewhat fictive It might be a positive thing in the sense that if there's a figure that's more amenable to reconciliation So with the West that might be a good thing But then also the question of you know who can who can speak for Eastern Libya and who can deliver and the East has its Own I mean its own serious grievances and issues beyond what Heftar was portraying Make some comments. Yeah on this issue. Well just on the last issue. I mean we I mean things in the East are Still under control the HR are taking care of matters really and so far Things have not gotten out of hand. So let's hope that you know the the hard work that's being that's going on now on Reconciliation of institutions and people is going to progress and we are really hopeful that maybe we can you know There is a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, but I wanted to comment on the DDR program the disarmament I mean one, you know one of the most important things that which you mentioned in your book actually is the arms influx in Libya So everybody is bringing arms to different groups in Libya that are combating and fighting each other and I don't want to go through the list of countries, but you have got a list a very long list of countries there So I mean the first I think I think here is to stop this influx of arms So if you want to work on stopping on GDR You got a first stop the proxy or stop the influx of weapons and then you have to have an alternative plan To all of these young men who also in the book is mentioned that many of them are either students or Engineers or you know unemployed youth who have got no resources no resources no jobs So there needs to be a plan to take all of these suits and give them something an education a future You know something to do and that's how we can start you know to disarm them But obviously as you said Fred We cannot it's a it's a big project that we would you know need a lot of help on and I think that one of the most important things is that the GDR started you know Plans for it started, you know and as early as 2013 with Zidane But everything that you know them it seems that the international community has got a problem with continuity So all of the plans they start and then they fall apart just like you know in 2011 We started so many projects like the national production against violence for gender-based violence We we signed contracts with the mass general hospital for training emergency doctors with Toronto with the you know with the cardiac doctors, you know to train our Surgeons we did we started so many things, but then there is always You know things do not continue. There is always discontinuity and this doesn't really help so I don't know I just wanted to mention these things because There is a place for GDR, but there is no will the political will you know that the Both sides on the Libyan side, but also on the international community side So and I think when I say this some just you know, I know that we are running short of time But I know that a lot of people say so why should we help you? Why don't you do it by yourselves? But I think that we have you know we the international community owes us The fact that we had been occupied for a very long period of time and we only got our independence in 1951 and the fact that our resources has always been used by the you know the region and the International community and the fact that we want to be a member of this global of the international community I think it you know obligates the international community to help us to make it so Okay, I'd like to open into questions from the audience And can you state your name briefly and please only only questions My name is Ali Abou Zakhouk Libyan American activist Question very simple Fred. Thank you for the book and a good work. I started reading it I just received it last night and I want to ask you a question out of my experience with you if you put a SWAT analysis SWAT analysis SWAT analysis there the bros and cones. Yeah, how could you give us a blueprint of what can Libya be seen through your experience the points of Positive points that can build the country the Negative points that can build the country down. You can you know, I'm an expert in You know civil society organizations, but I think you know what I meant. Sure. Sure. So please give us a brief idea because You are very well acquainted with the situation in Libya Well, I mean, I think the bright spots are things that the international community recognized You know early on that the country has a small population. It's it's concentrated geographically enormous oil wealth at its disposal I think one of the the positive things now that we need to build on is is municipal level governance I mean, this is one of the success stories where you have elected municipal Councils that do enjoy legitimacy that are answerable to their constituencies that are trying to deliver services That are bringing in income that are talking to one another in ways that the national actors are not and so I think that's I mean a strong You know building block. I mean the cliche is you know building building from the grassroots, but I think there's you know There's something there You know the national level process is frozen. So let's let's work in local communities. I mean the problem though is that can only take you so far because of the The gridlock at the top and the the economic problems the divided economic institutions. So You know, that's I think one one bright spot and then you know as dr. Layla, you know mentioned I think just the enormous. I mean resilience of the people that that spirit of civic activism. I think still thrives you have You know a number of I mean youth groups. You have entrepreneur groups tech startups I mean, these are all things that the international community recognizes and needs to support We've covered We've covered all of them and unfortunately my book talks a lot about about them. Yeah, I mean the Well, I mean that book doesn't get into too much But I think the recent, you know, it's just the degradation of the economy and the plunder and sort of the I just Libyans have not been served well by their their political class ordinary Libyans, you know And then the the culture of the armed groups is still, you know thriving. I think the international community has in some sense Supported that by pursuing short-term aims. So let's let's focus on countering ISIS We're gonna work through, you know malicious through factions on the ground Let's counter the the migrant challenge. And so these these international interventions are, you know, unhelpful to the larger cause of a cohesive state Thank you very much Edward Joseph National Council on US Libya relations Fred. Congratulations on the book. It sounds absolutely terrific I you use the word preordained. It was not preordained. I just have to say that listening to Ms. Bugak has described these eggshell institutions Complete lack of experience with civil society. I have to say it's just astonishing that anyone thought it would have Finished any other way given the experience not just in the Middle East But in the Balkans continuing struggles in Eastern Europe and the Balkans with transition and why anyone would have thought it Would somehow it be different in Libya is astonishing to me Fred. My question is Comes from your testimony last week before the House foreign affairs subcommittee on the Middle East North Africa And in it you said that there is a you referred accurately to the yawning national-level political divide in Libya and my question you just referred to it just before so my question for you is What is driving that national level yawning national-level political divide and does the UN? Set up this UN roadmap address that the real driver of that divide. Thank you Well, I mean unfortunately, you've had three plus years of conflict in in, you know, Benghazi You've had the development of you know parallel institutions in in the East you've had You know massive displacement of populations from I mean from Benghazi I think you've had a real hardening of identities that I encountered in the in the East and this sense of You know the grievances have really solidified into something and you have you know proto-state institutions, I Think it's not simply an east-west Divide it's it's often related to People who want to preserve some aspect of the old order versus the so-called, you know Revolutionary actors who want to remake it and exclude certain, you know people from that People who were part of the Qaddafi system. So these are you know, I mean they're not Irreparable and we've seen Zintan and Misrata these two towns that were at loggerheads, you know made you know made peace Does the UN you know process address it? I think it's it's the best thing that they have right now I mean the LPA for all of its flaws is a mark on the wall. It's worthy of amendments the The roadmap of a national conference to set up a constitution. I think is is a worthy You know objective You know, I think the there are talks now among different armed groups that we're not talking to one another which is positive the HOR is meeting with the high-state council. So there are you know, Libyans are interacting with one another Now I mean can the real you know roots of the of the grievances be addressed through a settlement? No I mean we're talking about Undoing decades of neglect in the east. We're talking about a mechanism for wealth distribution. I mean these are huge challenges We're talking about reunifying the security sector in a way that addresses local imperatives, you know for governance and so It's gonna be a long haul I look at Libya. Oh My name is Fatih Sikta when I look at Libya and Most of the Arab countries are run by tires Libya was very very special I look at Egypt Tunisia Those were states. They had institutions at political parties But in Libya, we had nothing we had get that he and get that he was the state Don we lost everything and We were left alone So don't you think and agree with me that what Happening in Libya and what has happened was bound to happen And what we are going through right now is a phase in our history That will lead us eventually to To recovery I hope But we have to have we have to go through this Because we had to do it on our own Okay, so I think that's what But this leads me to the second part of my question And This leads me to the second part of my question What is in your Assessment right now to the root cause of the problem what's going on right now? Why we're failing to reach a political solution Main the main reason because if you solve that you will solve the Libyan Case and the reason changes as we went through from 2011 until now So I have an answer for that, but I need to know yours Well, I appreciate your your long view of history and I mean I think you know revolutions take a long time And I say in the in the preface of my book that you know, Libya's stories not over So this is this is an ongoing You know process. I mean look, what's what's the root? I mean the If you listen to the UN's latest assessment, it's it's primarily You know an economic struggle for power with with political positions are sort of the front for actors to accrue, you know political wealth I think that's part of the story I think we're you know We're still grappling with this question that all revolutions confront which is how much of the old order Do you include how much do you exclude? We're grappling with hyperlocalization where because of the absence of institutions during and after the revolution people Gravitated toward these towns that are now acting as as autonomous, you know semi-autonomous units And so we're everything is hyper localized And so there's often this deceptive notion that some US policymakers have advanced to me that you know It's a small population. You should be able to get the top nine people in a room and hammer out an agreement Which we've seen has not worked because because of the diffusion of power It's you know, it gives the authority to spoilers that you know to spoil the process the other I mean we've heard about the other root causes of you know regional neglect about Unifying political institutions, I think the other piece of it is the Internationalization of the conflict that it's and it's not solely the Middle East powers, but it's it's European states We have the role of Russia now and so, you know these disparate International approaches to Libya's conflict have prolonged the conflict they've given factions Patrons to turn to and the weapons coming in, you know was a major turning point in the road to civil war in 2014 Some of these states are still hedging so I think the unfortunately Libya has fallen victim to this regional proxy war Hello, my name is Ahmed Ali and I am a Libyan and I'm also a teacher assistant at Johns Hopkins size So I just want to go back to some points raised by Miss Selwa. She said that During so I'm not broke a tuffy, but it's not right for our lawyers and judges to Say that the duty the law system was corrupt or was and not Transparent because the Mustafa Abdul Jalil in his latest Interview and he was the leader of the National Transitional Committee He said that the law system during the daffy times was transparent and it was somehow even with the mistakes of the regime they They were able to fix some of these mistakes however, I feel that even starting with 2008 and the regime started this reconized a Recon reconciliation System and you know a lot of the opposition who were outside they came to Libya and they started working with the daffy in his son And also they were giving substantial amount of money as compensation and they started working with the government but then they turned They turned the table over and things just changed and Libyan really trusted those You know those people, but what happened is that when? crisis okay, they just fled the country and I feel that One of the things that led to the to Libya to be a field state is the social context the tribal nature of the It's very difficult. I I come from a city which I Which is really Let me give you one example right now the college is controlled by one tribe the hospital is controlled by one One tribe you cannot go to college because it's not safe for you to be in there So how do you see the social context given that you've been in Libya for I think seven years you said not complete not During different visits the so the social context in terms of the role of tribes or what you know tribes I mean, it's it's interesting. They're they're not a political Identity tribes don't have a political party you find people in one tribe are on opposite sides of Political conflicts and the conflict in Benghazi some were you know with the Islamist somewhere anti So it's it crosses over. I think tribes is an important social identity. I don't think it's Antithetical to democracy. I don't think you can say because you're a tribal society or not, you know ready This is the classic argument of strongmen. I mean tribal sentiment, you know plays a role It's it's one identity of many that I think Libyans are able to coexist with and tribes have played a very beneficial role in Libya in mediating social conflicts in Stepping in where there's no formal institutions. So, you know, these are these are important developments Unfortunately, I think tribalism has you know become somewhat malignant. There's a sort of tribal supremacism That arises in certain places, but that's a result of conflict of social breakdown Yeah Thank you for your comments, which is very interesting And I wanted to I'm going to comment actually Talking about the law which you have stated that existed during Gaddafi Regime and tribalism funny enough. They are entwined because I lived in Libya most of my life and for decades during the Gaddafi regime, there was no law to For example, when somebody commits a crime in Libya, he doesn't go through the normal Channels of justice. He's not prosecuted and he's not tried and he doesn't get what he deserves Rather the tribe, you know meets with the other tribe, you know, the perpetrators tribe with the victims tribe You know, and we say a joke in Libya We say they sit and eat rice and meat and you know, and then this is it and everybody goes their own way So what Gaddafi did, you know when I grew up in in the early in the 70s in the early 70s. I was a child But I remember very well that in Benghazi, I didn't know what that I come from a certain tribe in Libya The first time I learned of me belonging to a tribe During the college days when I was called by the Revolutionary Committees of Gaddafi and Interrogated because my father was a political prisoner and they asked me which tribe to belong to and I was like what I gave my family name No, which tribe you're not Libyan. I said I am Libyan my four grandparents are Libyan my ancestors Go back 400 years in Benghazi. What are you talking about? He said no, what's we didn't know about tribalism? Because what happened is after the independence there was modern nation There was the start of building of a civil modern state there was Starting to build the rule of law and the proper, you know You know the the the real makeup of a state okay, and the tools that build a state and there was a constitution and we signed the conventions the human rights conventions and We were trying to implement them when Gaddafi came he just abolished everything He abolished the constitution ignored the human rights laws and he brought back the tribalism he is the one who actually brought back the tribalism and Made the tribe become the law in Libya and and this is really bad because you know You are a young man, but if you read the history of the caveman You know that he came out from the cave to the tribe then from the tribe to the city So we we can't go backwards. We want to move forwards I think do we have time for one more question or one more question. Okay, great My name is Dave Ballard. I thank you for your your presentations and I was I was particularly touched by your Evocation of the feeling in in Meghazi and in the country as a whole at the time in 2011 when people had hope for a New government I I followed Libya closely for for quite a while and I had that that same feeling I had the same feeling probably from about 2005 Up until about that time. I don't have that feeling anymore and when I look at Libya what what I actually see is is Somalia and I would like Both of you perhaps to convince me that Libya is somehow In a better shape than then Somalia is other than proximity to Europe. I don't see any difference between them. Oh My god, okay, you know funny enough and with all due respect to Somalia and to other Poor sub Saharan African nations I was just talking, you know before we came into Fred and I said when we used to watch the news in Libya about Somalia Afghanistan Yemen used to think, you know, what's wrong with these people, you know They're so backward. They're still carrying guns and shooting each other We'd never expected that we're gonna go, you know in the same direction, but Now Somalia has a completely different story But I'm talking about Libya my my homeland because I want to pretend to say that I know it very well, okay now You know, the story of Libya is not unique in the world It's the story of so many other countries across the globe that Suffered from occupation after occupation from tyranny from abuses and then, you know went to through revolutions To liberate themselves and to reach to you know the level where there is some humanity Hey where there is some You know civility humanity and where there is citizenship and Citizen citizen rights, and this is where we want to go, you know the social justice the Constitution the human rights the citizenship rights and so our roads unfortunately We thought that at this time during this time I mean in 2011 with all of the support from the international community We thought that we would make it and we wouldn't have to go through the very dark path that other nations went through Before they came to light and became civilized, but sadly, I guess not we are not getting any help we are getting actually a proxy war and a lot of meddling and This is not helping at all The majority of Libyan people I can assure you are not Holding the guns are not killing each other are not involved in what's happening It's actually this this what you see and what's happening at all levels of the Libyan conflict represents the Represents the extreme you know a Group of people who are you know on the scene but sadly when you have got the Resources which are the weapons here the guns and when you have people who are supplying you continuously with guns Then you have the power Because right now in Libya there is the rule of the gun and so everyone else has to keep quiet But we are hoping that maybe you know through people, you know who are talking who talk about Libya, you know through Our diplomatic Efforts through talking about our homeland through Writing books about Libya like what Fred did through these events to raise more awareness about Libya and about the need For us to get more help so that we can actually get out of this conflict, but I don't want you to despair and Let's hope that maybe in ten years We can meet again and then talk about some bright days in Libya And I hope that we are not going to go down the dark side for long Fred do you want to address I can't say it any better Well a good good note to end on and let me just briefly say there was a reception Next door right now happening, so please join us for that