Libya parliament adopts law on legislative polls

Libya's parliament on Monday passed a law on legislative elections, its spokesman said, ahead of a planned national vote set for December 24 under a UN-led peace process.

The legislature "passed a law on elections to the House of Representatives during Monday's sitting," Abdullah Bliheg of the eastern-based parliament wrote on Twitter.

The law comes less than a month after speaker Aguila Saleh signed off a presidential elections law in a move opponents said bypassed due process and favoured a run by his ally, eastern-based military chief Khalifa Haftar.

Days later, parliament passed a no-confidence vote in the Tripoli-based unity government of interim Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah.

Libya has endured a decade of bloodletting since the 2011 fall of dictator Moamer Ghadaffi in a NATO-backed uprising, which unleashed a complex civil war that dragged in multiple foreign powers.

A landmark ceasefire between eastern and western camps last year, after Haftar's unsuccessful year-long bid to seize Tripoli, paved the way to a UN-backed peace process.

Dbeibah's unity government took office in March with a mandate to lead the country to the December elections, but wrangling over the legal and consitutional basis for the polls has cast increasing doubts over the process.