This month, Saadi Gadhafi, the son of former Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, was extradited from Niger to Libya to face trial. In an email interview, Hanan Salah, a Libya researcher at Human Rights Watch, explained the progress and failures to date of Libya’s post-Gadhafi judiciary. WPR: What have been the areas of greatest progress and failure in the process of rebuilding Libya’s post-Gadhafi judiciary? Hanan Salah: More than two years after the end of the uprising, Libya’s justice system is facing numerous challenges, and the authorities are unable to impose law and order. Amid rampant violence mainly by unaccountable militias, [...]
Libyan Prime Minister Ali Zeidan was removed Tuesday after failing to stop a tanker from sailing away with an illicit shipment of Libyan oil. The event underscores the crucial role of the oil industry in the country’s current political instability, while further eroding initially optimistic expectations about Libya’s transition and the return to health of its oil industry. Not so long ago, the political and economic prospects for Libya looked brighter. The toppling of the Gadhafi regime in 2011 set the country on the path of a democratic transition. The oil sector, which is the backbone of the Libyan economy, [...]
Since the early 2000s, Algerian politics have been generally understood as a behind-the-scenes struggle between, on one hand, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and his regional and administrative allies and, on the other, the military intelligence service chief, Mohammed “Tewfik” Mediene. Over the past several months, however, Algeria’s deep politics have risen to the surface, exposing the main fault lines between the country’s most powerful political camps. With the April presidential election approaching, Algeria’s elite appears locked in dispute at the highest levels. Proponents of a fourth term for the aging and ailing Bouteflika are charging ahead, while his institutional rivals are [...]
