Rome: Italy and Libya signed an agreement on Friday to collaborate in the defense areas of training, health care and demining activities.
Italian Defense Minister Lorenzo Guerini met his Libyan counterpart Salahuddin Al-Namroush in Rome, where they signed the “Joint Technical Military Cooperation Agreement,” which renews a deal signed in 2013.
It calls for identifying new ways to collaborate in medical health care, starting with the training of Libyan medical staff by members of Italy’s field hospital in the northwestern Libyan city of Misrata.
It also commits to “a significant training plan for Libyan cadets and officers,” and underlines Italy’s willingness to collaborate on a demining center, according to Guerini, who visited Tripoli in August.
“Our commitment is primarily directed to support the process of stabilization, pacification and institutional reorganization we all hope for,” he said in a statement.
“We agreed with Italy to cooperate in the fields of military training, experience sharing, support, development, maintenance and consultancy,” Al-Namroush said in a statement after the signing ceremony in Italy’s capital Rome.
Italian colonization of Libya began in 1911 and lasted until 1943. Rome retains significant energy assets in the country and last year renewed a 2017 deal with the Libyan coastguard to block illegal migrants trying to leave from the country’s coast to Italy.
Libya is in the midst of a protracted civil war since the ouster of Moammar Gadhafi in 2011, with Italy backing the U.N.-recognized government of Prime Minister Fayez Sarraj established in 2015.
The Tripoli-based Government of National Accord (GNA) is also supported by Turkey and Qatar, while the opposing forces of putschist Gen. – Agencies
