The assistant secretary for Near East Affairs of the US Department of Sates, David Schenker, said the European Union’s Operation IRINI, which aims to stop arms shipments to war-torn Libya is not “serious”.
Schenker accused the European Union of not doing enough to end violations of a UN arms embargo by countries such as Russia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.
The US senior official said on Thursday the EU was biased as it criticized only Turkey’s involvement in the Libyan conflict.
“The only interdictions that the EU are doing is of Turkish military material that Turkey is sending to Libya. Nobody is interdicting Russian aircraft, nobody is interdicting Emirati aircraft, nobody is interdicting the Egyptians,” Schenker told German Marshall Fund think-tank during a virtual discussion.
“They could at least, if they were serious, I think, call them out – call out all parties of the conflict when they violate the arms embargo,” he said.
