Fezzan will be bargaining chip in Libya conflict

Significance

The Fezzan, Libya's vast southern region, has strategic value given its location and natural resources. Control over it, however tenuous, offers advantage now that the tide of the war has turned against eastern commander Khalifa Haftar.

Impacts

• The defection of southern groups from Haftar to the GNA will largely depend on developments in the military landscape in central Libya.
• Haftar’s forces will aim to keep control of the Fezzan, to deny the GNA control of a huge swathe of territory.
• Turkey and Russia will seek to leverage their respective military build-ups in Libya to delineate areas of influence.