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The Sahel’s trajectory is worrying; poverty and population growth, combined with growing jihadi extremism, contraband and human trafficking constitute the perfect storm of actual and potential instability. Without holistic, sustained efforts against entrenched criminal networks, misrule and underdevelopment, radicalisation and migration are likely to spread and exacerbate.

After returning from the frontlines, Crisis Group's Libya Senior Analyst Claudia Gazzini speaks to our Director of Communications and Outreach Hugh Pope to report her major findings on the presence of the Islamic State in the country. Gazzini argues that the critical humanitarian situation and the internal division of the many factions of this conflict can only be solved by, first, stopping the arms and economic supply to the actors involved and, second, pushing the peace talks forward.

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is implementing its strategy of atrocities with gruesome skill. After Iraq and Syria, the group is using Libya to force outside states to react on the basis of emotions, not strategic thinking. The beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians persuaded Egypt to bomb militant camps on Libya’s coast and to launch a diplomatic offensive at the U.N. Security Council to authorize military operations on Libyan soil.

After six months of worsening clashes, Libya is on the brink of all-out civil war and catastrophic state collapse. All parties must press the two rival authorities to join a national unity government, resolutely uphold the UN arms embargo, and persuade regional actors to stop fuelling the conflict.

In this Q&A, Crisis Group’s Libya Senior Analyst Claudia Gazzini discusses the upsurge in Islamic State activity in Libya.

Unless Libya breaks the cycle of violence and urgently reforms its justice system, there is a real risk of an increase in assassinations, urban violence and communal conflicts.

The violent death of the U.S. ambassador and three of his colleagues is a stark reminder of the challenges Libya still faces and should serve as a wake-up call for the authorities to urgently fill the security vacuum.