Gaddafis named as war crimes suspects by international criminal court
Chief prosecutor requests arrest warrants for Libyan leader, his son Saif al-Islam and intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi
- guardian.co.uk,
- Article history
Muammar Gaddafi, his son Saif al-Islam and his brother-in-law and intelligence chief, Abdullah Senussi, have been named as war crimes suspects by the chief prosecutor for the international criminal court in The Hague.
Presenting his request for arrest warrants to the ICC, the chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, said the men formed an inner circle who carried out the Libyan leader's orders to crush peaceful protests by ordering attacks with live ammunition and heavy weapons.
"His second eldest son Saif al-Islam is a de facto prime minister and Abdullah Senussi is his right-hand man, the executioner. [My] office documented how the three held meetings to plan and direct the operations," Moreno-Ocampo said. The prosecutor said he had "direct evidence" of the three men committing the crimes.
A panel of three ICC judges will now decide whether to grant the arrest warrants, after which Moreno-Ocampo said it was primarily up to Libyans themselves to enforce them.
However, the naming of Saif al-Islam as a prime suspect in crimes against humanity will alone be enough to cause shock and embarrassment to his prominent and wealthy circle of friends in Europe and the US, and particularly in the UK, where he studied at the London School of Economics and lived in Hampstead Garden Suburb, an exclusive district of London.
"His address book is going to be bulging with significant contacts. The question is going to be how long those contacts stayed in touch and at what point they cut him off," a source familiar with the investigation said. Those questions may be answered in part by a study of Saif al-Islam's mobile telephone records and other communications by the ICC investigators.
Philippe Sands, a University College London professor currently writing a book on the making of international law, said: "This is a new direction for the ICC in the sense that an individual closely associated with the establishment in many western countries now finds himself the subject of an indictment."
If the ICC issues the arrest warrants, it will deepen the embarrassment of the London School of Economics, where Saif al-Islam studied and which accepted a £1.5m donation from a foundation he controlled to fund a north African research programme. Of that total, £300,000 was spent before the programme was suspended.
Saif al-Islam's western image as a sophisticated reformer was badly dented when he appeared on television after the outbreak of pro-democracy protests in Libya, vowing that the regime would fight "to the last bullet".
However, in his application for an arrest warrant for crimes against humanity, Moreno-Ocampo argues not only that Saif al-Islam incited violence, but presents evidence that he also played a central role in the machinery of Libyan repression.
Laying out his case, Moreno-Ocampo said: "The evidence shows that Muammar Gaddafi personally ordered attacks on unarmed Libyan civilians.
"His forces attacked Libyan civilians in their homes and in the public space, shot demonstrators with live ammunition, used heavy weaponry against participants in funeral processions and placed snipers to kill those leaving mosques after the prayers.
"The evidence shows that such persecution is still ongoing, as I speak today, in the areas under Gaddafi control.
"Gaddafi's forces prepare lists with names of alleged dissidents. They are being arrested, put into prisons in Tripoli, tortured and made to disappear."
Richard Dicker, the director of the international justice programme at Human Rights Watch said: "The prosecutor's announcement is a warning bell to others in Libya that serious crimes there will be punished.
"While it's up to the judges to weigh the evidence and decide, the request for an arrest warrant for Muammar Gaddafi is a remarkable development for victims in Libya, the ICC and justice more broadly."
Early on in the Libyan conflict, western officials – who had long viewed Saif al-Islam as a westernised reformer – portrayed him as a possible conduit for peace talks.
However, sources close to Moreno-Ocampo's office insist that no pressure was applied by western governments to stop him seeking arrest warrants, as they had drawn their own conclusions that he was playing a central role in the crushing of the protests.
"Although it takes Saif Gaddafi out of any possible resolution, it will increase pressure on others to sort this out sooner rather than later, before they too are indicted," Sands said.
Some of Moreno-Ocampo's strongest evidence is believed to have come from inside the regime itself. The prosecutor even issued a statement on Sunday boasting of the co-operation from Tripoli, in an apparent effort to stir paranoia inside the regime over who is informing on whom.
"During the last week, the office of the prosecutor received several calls from high-level officials in Gaddafi's regime willing to provide information," the statement read.
Moreno-Ocampo made it clear that if the ICC approves his request for the three arrest warrants, he will not be asking Nato to enforce them.
That would primarily be a job for the Libyan authorities, he said, in what appeared a clear invitation to other regime insiders to turn against the Gaddafi clan.
by Julian Borger taken from http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/16/gaddafis-war-crimes-suspects
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