date.
The talks had originally been slated for 9 December but
have been repeatedly delayed as fighting has intensified between the
beleaguered internationally recognised government and Islamist-backed
militias.
The UN mission spokesperson Samir Ghattas told Libyan
media late on Sunday that efforts were continuing to get the talks back
on track.
More than three years after dictator Muammar Gaddafi was
toppled and killed in a Nato-backed revolt, the country remains awash
with weapons and powerful militias, and has rival governments and
parliaments.
The UN Special Representative Bernardino Leon in
Libya chaired a first round of talks between rival lawmakers in the
oasis town of Ghadames in September.
Deepening conflict
But
his efforts to convene a new round of talks and to broker parallel
negotiations between the warring parties have so far failed, despite a
warning by the UN Security Council in October that it would impose
sanctions on any party that undermined the process.
The
internationally recognised parliament voted last week not to attend any
negotiations if the rival legislature in Tripoli was invited.
The
Islamist-backed militia alliance that controls the capital and Libya's
third largest city Misrata launched an offensive last month to try to
capture the country's main eastern oil export terminals.
Loyalists
of the internationally recognised government, which has taken refuge in
the remote east, responded with their first air strikes on Misrata.
The
United Nations says that since fighting intensified in May, hundreds of
civilians have been killed and hundreds of thousands more have fled
their homes.
Arab League ambassadors were due to meet in Cairo later on Monday to discuss the deepening conflict.
Libya's neighbours, fearful of a spillover of the violence, have repeatedly called for international intervention.
But
French President Francois Hollande said on Monday that any intervention
would require a "clear mandate" from the United Nations, "clear
organisation" and the appropriate "political conditions".
"We're not yet going down that road," Hollande told French radio.
AFP
