17.05.11 - ICC/LIBYA - PORTRAIT OF THREE GADDAFI'S CLAN SUSPECTS

The Hague, May 17, 2011 (FH) - Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Luis Moreno Ocampo on May 16 requested the judges to issue arrest warrants against Muammar Gaddafi, his son Saif Al-Islam and his brother-in-law Abdullah Al-Senoussi. According to the prosecution, the three men « planned » the crimes against humanity committed against civilians since the beginning of the rebellion against Tripoli's regime on February 15, 2011.

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Muammar Gaddafi was born in 1942 from a Bedouin father originating from Syrte's desert. According to Libya's specialist Patrick Haimzadeh, he set up « a regime without equivalent in the whole world ». The young Gaddafi was inspired by the Suez Canal crisis and Algeria's war, writes Haimzadeh in his book « At the heart of Gaddafi's Libya ». He created a clandestine revolutionary movement when he was 17. He then studied the law at Misrata University before joining Benghazi Military Academy.

He took power in 1969, overthrowing King Idris I. In his famous "Green Book", Gaddafi explains his Pan-Arabic and anti-imperialist "People's Revolution" as based on the alliance between Islam and Socialism.

However, Libya under Gaddafi's rule was a classic dictatorship relying on nepotism, with repression of dissidence, torture, murders and acts of state-sponsored terrorism. American President Ronald Reagan once called him a "mad dog" and in the 90's Libya ended blacklisted with other states suspected of terrorism.

Gaddafi also laid a campaign for creating United States of Africa - with a continental army and a single currency - but he did not succeed.

Facing tough economic times, Gaddafi finally decided to break Libya's isolation: he put an end to Libya's armament program, stopped sponsoring terrorism and compensated victims of Lockerbie and UTA's DC10 terrorist attempts.

Gaddafi's brother in law Abdullah Al-Senoussi is the brother of Gaddafi's first wife. He has been sentenced in absentia to life in jail by a French court for his role in UTA's DC10 terrorist attempt, which caused the death of 170 civilians in the Niger desert.

According to Patrick Haimzadeh, Al-Senoussi was at the time in charge of "neutralizing exiled political opponents and terrorist attempts". He is still under an international arrest warrant issued by the French judiciary which remains in effect until 2019. Al-Senoussi is currently the Head of the Military intelligence and considered as Gaddafi's "right hand man".

Saif Al-Islam is Gaddafi's favorite son, Al-Senoussi's nephew and the de facto Prime Minister of Libya.

He has studied architecture and economics before getting a PhD at the prestigious London School of Economics to which he made a donation of 1.5 million dollars.

As the President of "Gaddafi's Foundation", Al-Islam was supposed to give the regime a modern look. The foundation even released a document on human rights abuse in Libya in 2003. However, Al-Islam is more a businessman than anything: he controls the National Oil Company and Libyan Arab Foreign Investment Company (Lafico), among others.

SM/GF/FK

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