Libyan MP dies of COVID-19 in Morocco hospital

TRIPOLI — Libyan MP Omar Garmil has died in Morocco weeks after being infected with COVID-19, multiple sources said on Monday.

The UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli and the UN mission in Libya offered their condolences without mentioning the cause or place of his death on Sunday.

Garmil had participated in a meeting in Tangiers in late November with 120 other members of Libya’s House of Representatives, where MPs pledged to “end the divisions” that plague their country.

He was then hospitalised in Tangiers, where he died from COVID-19 on Sunday, according to a Moroccan diplomatic source.

Morocco has reported nearly 400,000 cases of the virus, including 6,624 deaths, while Libya has recorded some 91,000 cases, including 1,314 deaths.

Libya has been riven by violence since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising that toppled and killed veteran dictator Muammar Qadhafi, with two rival administrations vying for control of the oil-rich country.

The GNA, resulting from UN talks in 2015, is based in the capital. The east is dominated by the forces of strongman Khalifa Haftar, who backs a parliament elected in 2014 and based in the city of Tobruk.

The House of Representatives, which has refused to ratify the Tripoli administration, is deeply divided internally.

A ceasefire was signed in late October between the two sides and talks under the aegis of the UN are ongoing to steer the country out of years of bloody turmoil and forge a permanent peace.