Post date: Aug 09, 2012 12:54:1 PM
Libya-Power Handover -- Libya's NTC hands over power to new national assembly
CCTV BEIJING - Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC) handed over full political authority to the newly elected National Assembly, the nation's interim parliament, in a late-night ceremony on Wednesday.
NTC chief Mustafa Abdel Jalil announced that the council handed over the constitutional duties for leading the state to the general national congress which would be the sole legitimate representative of the Libyan people.
The National Transitional Council, the political arm of the opposition forces that toppled Colonel Muammar Gaddafi a year ago, will be dissolved.
The 200-member congress will name a new prime minister who will be charged with picking a government, passing laws and steering Libya to full parliamentary elections after a new constitution is drafted next year.
However, frequent violence in the run-up to the transition has demonstrated the country's precarious stability and fragile security situation.
"The transitional government has taken some measures to solve the security problems, and I hope the new assembly can continue it to make Libya much more safe and in order, at least to take back some arms left in the country," said Libya's Prime Minister Abdul Rahim al-Keab.
The NTC will then be dissolved, but the peaceful transition has been overshadowed by several violent incidents in the past week, including attacks in the capital Tripoli and Benghazi that targeted a military and a former intelligence building.
"Security, I think right now it's very good compared with other countries," said Mustafa Abu Shagour, Libya's deputy prime minister, adding that countries like China have companies based in less secure countries like Iraq.
"Libya has far better security, but it is gonna be better in the next few months," he said.
Representatives of civil society groups and diplomatic missions in Libya, as well as NTC and government officials, attended the ceremony.
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