The interior minister of Libya's U.N.-backed government survived an ambush by gunmen on his motorcade on Sunday, a brazen attack highlighting the towering challenges that remain for the newly appointed government that is trying to unite the country before elections late this year.

Armed men opened fire at Fathi Bashagha's motorcade on a highway in Tripoli, wounding at least one of his guards, said Amin al-Hashmi, a spokesman for the Tripoli-based Health Ministry.

Private security contractor and ally of former US President Trump Erik Prince violated a United Nations arms embargo on Libya, UN investigators have found in a report detailed by US media on Friday.

Libyan delegates meet Monday for UN-backed talks in Geneva to choose a new temporary executive to lead the war-scarred country through a transition until scheduled December elections.

Over 350 migrants have been rescued off the Libyan coast by the Ocean Viking humanitarian vessel in just two days, a French NGO running the boat said on Saturday.

Libyan officials from rival administrations on Tuesday began talks in an Egyptian Red Sea resort about constitutional arrangements for presidential and parliamentary elections later this year, the United Nations said.

According to the U.N. acting envoy for Libya, Stephanie Williams, failure to find an arrangement will have "negative repercussions on the other tracks, including the security and economic situation."

Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar travelled to Libya on Saturday flanked by top military officers to inspect Turkish units in the war-torn country, the official Anadolu news agency reported.

The UN Security Council on Tuesday called for all mercenaries and foreign fighters to leave Libya, in a unanimous statement that included Russia, which is accused of enabling a Russian contractor to send paramilitaries.

Social media and smartphones briefly gave youthful Arab Spring protesters a technological edge that helped topple ageing dictatorships a decade ago as their revolutionary spirit went viral.

European states involved in efforts to end the conflict in Libya on Monday threatened sanctions against any parties that harm the fragile peace process.

Britain, France, Germany and Italy in a joint statement urged "all Libyan and international parties to refrain from any parallel and uncoordinated initiative" that risked undermining the UN-led efforts. 

From his lavish Cairo apartment overlooking the Nile, Ahmed Kadhaf al-Dam reminisces fondly about the iron-fisted rule of Libya by his cousin Moamer Kadhafi, nearly a decade after his ouster.