Egypt chief-of-staff mediates between Libyan rivals in Cairo

CAIRO – Egypt’s chief-of-staff has mediated between two Libyan rivals who refused to meet face to face in Cairo but later agreed to form a committee to renegotiate a U.N. peace deal.

Col. Tamer el-Rifai, an Egyptian army spokesman, says the two — the head of Libya’s U.N.-backed government, Fayez Serraj, and Khalifa Hifter, the country’s most powerful army commander — met separately with Egypt’s chief-of-staff, Lt. Gen. Mahmoud Hegazy late on Tuesday.

He says they agreed to form a joint committee that would make key changes to the 2015 U.N.-brokered peace deal.

Once the parliament, based in eastern Libya, endorses the changes, it would pave the way for parliamentary and presidential elections next year.

Libya’s east-based parliament does not recognize the U.N.-backed government set up in the country’s capital, Tripoli.