Libya CSPA Country Profile • Stimson Center

CSPA Implementation Tracker

Libya

Years Listed

Each shaded box corresponds to a year the country appeared on the CSPA list and what types of waivers it received, if any.

Libya appeared on the CSPA list in 2012 and again in 2020, 2021, 2023, and 2024. The U.S. president waived, either in part or in full, CSPA prohibitions against the provision of U.S. arms sales and military assistance to Libya for all four years, resulting in the provision of nearly $169 million in arms sales and military assistance. Specifically, the president waived more than $160 million in Direct Commercial Sales, $392,000 in International Military Education and Training, and $8.4 million in Section 1206 or Section 333 assistance. The president has never denied Libya any arms sales or military assistance due to CSPA prohibitions.

During Libya’s 2011 civil war, the armed forces of Muammar Qadhafi and other pro-regime elements allegedly recruited and used child soldiers, as did the armed forces of the Transitional National Council, Libya’s de facto government following Qadhafi’s ouster.¹ Additionally, approximately 6,500 children identified themselves as “revolutionaries” following the war, some of whom may have supported militias during the war.² Following these reports, Libya was added to the CSPA list in 2012. While there were a few isolated reports of children carrying weapons and manning checkpoints during the reporting period for the 2013 CSPA list, their affiliation to an armed group or government force remained unclear.³ Therefore, Libya was not included on the 2013 list nor any subsequent list until 2020.

Libya’s reappearance on the 2020 CSPA list followed reports that the Special Deterrence Force, a paramilitary police force nominally operating under the command of Libya’s UN-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA), used and recruited child soldiers.⁴ Libya remained on the CSPA list in 2021 after an international organization verified that GNA and GNA-aligned armed groups recruited and used child soldiers between April 2020 and March 2021, the reporting period for the 2021 CSPA list.⁵

In March 2021, a UN-led process established the Libyan Government of National Unity (GNU). However, the GNU has not been able to effectively govern much of Libya, which remains outside its control. During the reporting period for the 2022 CSPA list, the GNU did not report taking any steps to prevent the recruitment and use of child soldiers in the country, and observers continued to report government complicity in human trafficking. Although the U.S. State Department noted that “various armed groups, militias, and criminal networks infiltrated the administrative ranks of the government and abused their positions to engage in […] alleged unlawful child soldier recruitment and use,” Libya was not included in the 2022 CSPA list.⁶

Libya reappeared on the CSPA list in 2023 and 2024 following reports that armed groups that operate under the government coordinated with and provided support to factions of the Syrian National Army, an armed group that recruited and used Syrian children as child soldiers in combat and support roles in Syria and in support roles in Libya, between April 2022 and March 2024.⁷

Since 2021, U.S. presidents have been required to include justifications for CSPA waivers that were issued during the previous year in the annual Trafficking in Persons Report. Libya’s 2020 and 2021 waiver justifications maintain that “[t]he United States provides targeted assistance to strengthen key Libyan institutions and build security capacity, promote political reconciliation, and increase Libya’s capacity to stand on its own through more effective governance.”⁸

For more information, see the U.S. State Department’s 2024 Trafficking in Persons Report and 2023 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. More information on the situation in Libya can also be found in the UN Secretary-General’s 2024 annual report on Children and Armed Conflict.

Total Waived and Prohibited

Since the CSPA took effect.

Explore the Data

Country- and program-level data on the number and type of national interest waivers granted, as well as the amount of arms sales and military assistance waived.

Amounts

Waivers

Amounts

Waivers