Syria and Libya agreed on Sunday to reopen Syria's embassy in Tripoli, closed since 2012, and to reactivate a joint prime-ministerial committee for coordinating bilateral ties, following talks between Libyan Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah and Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shaibani in the Libyan capital.
Syria and Libya agree to reopen embassy, restore bilateral committee after 14-year break
Syria and Libya agreed on Sunday to reopen Syria's embassy in Tripoli, closed since 2012, and to reactivate a joint prime-ministerial committee for coordinating bilateral ties, following talks between Libyan Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah and Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shaibani in the Libyan capital.
Al-Shaibani arrived in Tripoli on Sunday to meet with Libyan officials, according to a statement from Libya's Government of National Unity (GNU). During the visit, Damascus and Tripoli signed an agreement to reactivate the Libyan-Syrian Joint Higher Committee, a body at the prime ministerial level tasked with coordinating political, economic, and social ties between the two countries.
Dbeibah and al-Shaibani also agreed to open a Syrian consulate in Benghazi. The talks covered security cooperation and counterterrorism, consular services, and the status of prisoners, detainees, and refugees from both countries, according to the GNU statement. On the economic side, the two sides addressed unresolved financial dues between Libyan and Syrian institutions. Al-Shaibani also met separately with Libya's oil and gas minister and the head of the country's investment authority to discuss energy and investment cooperation.
Syria's embassy in Libya was closed in 2012 after Libya's then-Transitional National Council recognised the Syrian opposition and severed diplomatic relations with the government of then-Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Syrian opposition forces ousted al-Assad in December 2024, ending 61 years of Baath Party rule. In August 2025, a Syrian delegation raised the post-Assad Syrian flag over the Tripoli embassy, signalling that its reopening was imminent.
Libya has been divided since 2014 between the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity, led by Dbeibah, and an eastern administration led by Osama Hammad and backed by military commander Khalifa Haftar. Representatives of Libya's rival governments signed a separate deal on Sunday to hold national elections within two years.
- The source does not state a specific timeline for the physical reopening of the Syrian embassy in Tripoli.
- The source does not state whether Libya's eastern administration, led by Osama Hammad and backed by Khalifa Haftar, was party to or informed of the agreements reached with Syria.
- The source does not detail the nature or value of the unresolved financial dues between Libyan and Syrian institutions.
- The source does not specify what security cooperation or counterterrorism measures were agreed upon.
- The source does not include any statement from al-Shaibani directly.
Read the original at Al Jazeera English