“The second round of the Libyan Economic Dialogue (LED), that ended in Rome yesterday, marked progress in enhancing security for the people and the resumption of a shared economic and tax policy. The competitiveness of the economy and of Libyan currency and resumption of oil exports are essential to overcome the difficulties the Country is in today” said Paolo Gentiloni, Foreign Affairs Minister, at this morning’s meeting at the Farnesina with Libyan Deputy Premier, Mr Ahmed Maitig, after yesterday’s technical meeting. Gentiloni also confirmed “Italy’s full support for the Libyan Political Agreement and for the Institutions it will produce”.

The meeting of the LED, launched at the Ministerial Meeting in London on 31 October upon an Italian-US joint initiative, was co-chaired by Italy and the US in the presence of Deputy-Premier Maitig, the Governor of the Central Bank, El Kebir, and other representatives of Libya’s leading institutions. The meeting was attended also by SRSG Kobler, who during the morning had met with Minister Gentiloni, and with the representatives of the International Monetary Fund, of the World Bank, the United States, France and the United Kingdom.

The Rome meeting was an opportunity for defining an outline of actions to be implemented on the basis of a time schedule agreed by all participants including the approval of the 2017 national budget by 1 December next, of a mechanism for institutional coordination between the Government and the Central Bank and other priority actions concerning the lack of liquidity, the revision of the anti-money laundering law and a package of tax policy and exchange rate measures.