UN Report Highlights Escalating Human Rights Abuses Against Migrants in Libya

New York – A recent United Nations report warns of a “brutal and normalized reality” for migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in Libya, detailing a sharp rise in exploitation and human rights violations. The report, released jointly by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) on February 18, 2026, underscores the urgent need for coordinated action to end impunity and ensure protection for vulnerable populations.

Findings of the UN Report

The report, covering the period from January 2024 to December 2025, is based on interviews with nearly 100 migrants from 16 countries across Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. It reveals an “exploitative model” where abuses have turn into commonplace. Migrants and refugees face abduction, arbitrary detention, human trafficking, forced labor, enforced disappearances, and severe forms of abuse, including sexual and gender-based violence and torture.

Conditions are particularly dire near Libya’s borders, where traffickers, smugglers, armed groups, and even state actors subject individuals to systematic violence and exploitation. Detention centers are described as “breeding grounds for human rights violations and abuses,” according to Suki Nagra, the UN Human Rights Representative to Libya.

The report highlights a disturbing trend of racist and xenophobic hate speech and attacks against migrants, asylum-seekers, and refugees. Interceptions at sea, resulting in individuals being returned to Libya, are also criticized, as Libya is not considered a safe place for disembarkation.

Specific Abuses Documented

• Desert Abandonment: Between June 2023 and December 2025, approximately 13,783 migrants were intercepted at the Libya-Tunisia border by Libyan authorities. Many face refoulement and are left without access to basic necessities like water, food, or medical care.
• Forced Expulsions: Between July 2024 and June 2025, repeated waves of forced expulsions and abandonment in the Sahara Desert occurred. At least 463 individuals were deported to Niger in July 2024, followed by over 1,400 more between January and June 2025, many of whom were Nigerian nationals, including women and children.
• Tragic Outcomes: Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reported finding 16 people in the Sahara Desert – including a mother and daughter who died of thirst – with nine others reported missing.
• Arbitrary Arrests and Extortion: Survivors reported arbitrary arrests in Tripoli, Misrata, and Sabha, where they experienced extortion, torture, and confiscation of belongings before being abandoned in the desert.
• Sexual and Gender-Based Violence: A sharp increase in human trafficking and sexual and gender-based violence was reported in 2025, particularly within migrant detention facilities. Five girls aged between 14 and 17 were raped multiple times in 2024 and 2025 in al-Kufra trafficking hubs and Tripoli.
• Exploitation and Forced Labor: Detainees are often subjected to forced labor under coercive conditions, including garbage collection, mechanical work, agricultural labor, and even serving as cell guards.

Libya’s Commitment to a Political Solution

On Tuesday, February 17, 2026, Libya’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Taher El Sonni, met with the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy to Libya, Hanna Tetteh, ahead of a briefing to the UN Security Council. El Sonni reaffirmed Libya’s commitment to supporting national leadership and ownership of the political solution, emphasizing the need for any political outcomes to lead to ending the transitional phases and moving toward general elections. He stressed that any political process must be grounded in genuine national will and aim to end division and strengthen stability.

Taher M. El-Sonni addressed the Security Council on February 18, 2026, regarding the situation in Libya.

Recommendations and Calls to Action

The UN report urges Libyan authorities to immediately release arbitrarily detained individuals, halt violent interception practices, and end forced labor and human trafficking. It also calls for effective accountability mechanisms for human rights violations.

the report calls on the international community to review any funding, training, or cooperation with Libyan entities accused of human rights violations, ensuring compliance with international human rights standards.

“We recommend legal and policy changes to end the entrenched, exploitative business model driving these violations and abuses,” said Nagra. “A key area is accountability – holding security actors, traffickers, and complicit State-affiliated actors responsible. Accountability provides justice to victims and serves as a deterrent to further violations and abuses.”