On 24 January, the Arab Center Washington DC published an article entitled 'Turkey Faces a Dilemma in its Foreign Policy Toward Libya' by non-resident fellow Mustafa Gurbuz. It addresses the impasse Turkey is facing in Libya, following the GNU-Turkey hydrocarbon Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and renewed discussions with the House of Representatives (HoR). Gurbuz says that Turkey's policy in Libya is counterproductive to its overarching goals: 'exclusive dealings between Ankara and the Tripoli government go against Turkey’s own goal of healing the divisions between Libya’s rival factions, which is ultimately the best means by which to secure Turkey’s interests in the eastern Mediterranean'. He assesses that three aspects are shaping Turkey's Libya policy dilemma: 'changing priorities in Turkish foreign policy more broadly are an important driver for policy decisions in Libya', 'shifting dynamics among Libya’s political elite present a risk to Turkey’s strategic calculations', and that 'Turkey’s fast-approaching presidential election...does not help to calibrate the strategic communications that Ankara aims to articulate'. Gurbuz says that Turkey's main dilemma will centre around finding a legitimate Libyan body to support, though he says without elections that Libya's political elite will remain divided and weak.
Read the full article here: https://arabcenterdc.org/resource/turkey-faces-a-dilemma-in-its-foreign-policy-toward-libya/