Financial Crime and Terrorism Financing in Libyan Arab Jamahiriya

The United Nations Security Council is set to vote on a European Union proposal this week to authorize military action off Libya’s coast to stop illegal migration across the Mediterranean. While addressing these flows is crucial, interventions off Libya’s coast alone are unlikely to have a significant impact on the flow of migrants.

The Limitations of Sea-Based Action

Interventions off Libya’s coast may even increase the flow of migrants as smugglers often disregard their fate once they leave Libyan shores. A closer look at the criminal economies across the Sahara reveals that sea-based action is not only unlikely to stop the trade but might trigger a greater threat: driving profits into the hands of the Islamic State (IS).

Sustainable Solutions

Instead, sustainable solutions require targeted analysis on how to reduce the profit from smuggling and prevent the rescuing of seaborne refugees from supporting IS’s threat finance business model. This may involve areas beyond Libya.

Reducing Motivation for Refugees and Migrants

Upstream interventions to reduce the motivation for refugees and migrants to enter the organized crime trafficking chain to Libya should be a greater priority. This can best be done by:

• Improving Emergency Provisions: Substantially increasing aid provided to and protection of refugee camps in Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan.
• Promoting Awareness Campaigns: Informing refugees of the risks of abuse, slave labor, or death incurred by engaging with migrant-smuggling networks.
• Targeting Smuggling Networks: Effectively targeting smuggling networks and choke points, such as the coast of Lebanon, Sinai, Egypt, and Sudan; or diverting and facilitating migrant flows to land routes. The Sinai should receive particular attention, along with flows from Yemen to this corridor.

Improving Intelligence and Analysis

Substantially improving intelligence and analysis on routes, choke points, and organizational structures of the migrant smuggling chain as close as possible to the source countries is crucial.

Long-Term Solution: Reducing Refugee Flows

In the long term, reducing the number of refugees fleeing conflict zones is the only solution. However, these short-term actions can be taken to prevent an increase in threat finance to radical groups, as well as complete destabilization of Lebanon and Jordan and subsequent funding of armed groups in Sinai, Egypt, and Libya.