Head of UN Support Mission to Libya (UNSMIL), Bernardino Leon, has said that the mission would later on Thursday, propose a list of candidates for a unity government in Libya.

The decision was made after the General National Congress (GNC) in Tripoli failed to propose names for the unity government as expected on Wednesday.

“We will be able to propose a government.

“The government and the agreement will be supported by a huge majority of the Libyans all over the country, including of course, Tripoli,’’ Leon said at a news conference in the Moroccan city of Skhirat.

According to him, the latest text of the UN brokered agreement is final and not going to change.

He said that the two main parties in Libya’s political dialogue, GNC and Libya’s internationally recognised House of Representatives, were expected to agree on five names for the Presidential Council by the end of the week.

On Monday, Leon resumed talks with the Libyan warring parties, and at the close of last round of the talks, he insisted that the final deadline for signing the agreement would not be beyond Oct. 20.

The UN-brokered Libyan political agreement was initiated in July, 2015 by the House of Representatives, alongside representatives of political parties, municipalities and civil society groups.

Libya, a major oil producer in North Africa, has been witnessing a frayed political process after its former leader, Muammar Gaddafi, was toppled during the 2011 political turmoil.

The country is now deadlocked in a dogfight between the pro-secular army and Islamist militants, which has led to a security vacuum for home-grown extremism to brew. (Xinhua/NAN)