Member States’ Ambassadors to the European Union (Coreper) agreed on Thursday 26 March on the mandate for the operation to monitor compliance with the arms embargo on Libya, several sources confirmed to EUROPE.
This operation will be called Irini, the Greek name for Irene, and it will benefit from air, naval and satellite assets to carry out its mission. It will have an area of operation further east than EUNAVFORMed Sophia and will also serve as a response to the agreement between Libya and Turkey last November on the delimitation of maritime jurisdictions in the Mediterranean (see EUROPE 12387/33), according to a European source.
Indeed, the national ambassadors reached agreement on the last outstanding issue after the videoconference of Foreign Ministers on Monday 23 March, namely the disembarkation of migrants who may be recovered by the operation’s vessels (see EUROPE 12452/22). According to one diplomat, they agreed that potential rescued migrants would be landed in Greece. In exchange, Athens will receive financial support from the EU for the cost of the landing and the cost of the migrants who disembark before the latter are distributed amongst the volunteer states.
The decision to launch the operation will be formally adopted by written procedure. It will be launched on Friday 27 March and will end on Tuesday 31 March. The aim is to launch Irini on the same day to take over from the Sophia operation, whose mandate will end on March 31. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)