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Libya’s floods are result of climate crisis meeting a failed state

By Patrick Wintour

13 Sep 2023 · 3 min read

informed Summary

  1. Libya faces a disaster due to the combination of the climate crisis and its failed state, with a quarter of the city of Derna being swept into the sea by Storm Daniel. This devastation is also a result of the country's political instability following the ousting of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

When the climate crisis meets a failed state, the outcome is the kind of disaster that Libya is witnessing in Derna.

Any city would have struggled with the extraordinary level of precipitation that Storm Daniel visited upon Libya’s northern coast. In its earlier, milder form, the storm caused severe damage in Greece before it crossed the Mediterranean.

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