Saadi Gaddafi’s Family Plans Int’l Lawsuit to Release him

Saadi Gaddafi in his prison outfit. Getty images
Saadi Gaddafi in his prison outfit. Getty images
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Saadi Gaddafi’s Family Plans Int’l Lawsuit to Release him

Saadi Gaddafi in his prison outfit. Getty images
Saadi Gaddafi in his prison outfit. Getty images

The family of slain former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has warned that it would file lawsuits locally and internationally to press for the release of his third son Saadi, accusing the parties detaining him of torture.

In April last year, Tripoli's court of appeals acquitted Saadi Gaddafi of murdering Bashir al-Rayani, a former footballer and coach of Tripoli's Al-Ittihad football club, in 2005.

Since his extradition from Niger in March 2014, Saadi has been held in al-Hadaba prison in the Libyan capital Tripoli.

His family said in a statement carried by the pro-Gaddafi Jana news agency that it would “file the lawsuits against all those involved in Saadi’s incarceration and his torture despite being acquitted by the court.”

It claimed that Saadi’s captors denied him the appropriate medical care, putting his life in danger.

The family urged the international community and human rights officials to assume their legal and moral responsibilities against those who have “lost their conscience” and continued to "torture" Saadi Gaddafi despite his acquittal.

Al-Hadaba is among the most notorious prisons in Libya where thousands of prisoners, including former regime figures, are held.

A source close to the Gaddafi family told Asharq Al-Awsat that several lawyers have been tasked with filing the lawsuits against a “long list of personalities who will be accused of involvement in torturing Saadi and denying him freedom.”

The family complained last year that it had lost contact with Saadi, saying “all we know is that he has been taken hostage to a prison that is run by militias in the capital.”

But the Libyan prosecutor’s office snapped back, claiming Saadi remains in the Tripoli prison and "hasn’t left it.”



Sudan's RSF, Allied Groups to Sign Charter to Form Parallel Government, Two Signatories Say

Sudanese refugees wait their turn to get drinking water from a muddy pond in Gerbana, a village 22km from the Sudanese border, South Sudan, 13 February 2025 (issued on 15 February 2025), as water shortages and diseases resulting from contaminated water have become the community's main complaint. (EPA)
Sudanese refugees wait their turn to get drinking water from a muddy pond in Gerbana, a village 22km from the Sudanese border, South Sudan, 13 February 2025 (issued on 15 February 2025), as water shortages and diseases resulting from contaminated water have become the community's main complaint. (EPA)
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Sudan's RSF, Allied Groups to Sign Charter to Form Parallel Government, Two Signatories Say

Sudanese refugees wait their turn to get drinking water from a muddy pond in Gerbana, a village 22km from the Sudanese border, South Sudan, 13 February 2025 (issued on 15 February 2025), as water shortages and diseases resulting from contaminated water have become the community's main complaint. (EPA)
Sudanese refugees wait their turn to get drinking water from a muddy pond in Gerbana, a village 22km from the Sudanese border, South Sudan, 13 February 2025 (issued on 15 February 2025), as water shortages and diseases resulting from contaminated water have become the community's main complaint. (EPA)

Sudan's Rapid Support Forces will sign a charter with allied political and armed groups on Saturday evening to establish a "government of peace and unity" in territories it controls, signatories al-Hadi Idris and Ibrahim Mirghani told Reuters.

The RSF has seized most of the western Darfur region and swathes of the Kordofan region in an almost-two-year war, but is being pushed back from central Sudan by the Sudanese army, which has condemned the formation of a parallel government.

Such a government, which has already drawn an expression of concern from the United Nations, is not expected to receive widespread recognition. Those affiliated with the government say its formation will be announced from inside the country.

General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, head of the paramilitary that has been accused of widespread abuses including genocide, was hit with sanctions by the United States earlier this year.

The war, which erupted after disagreements between the RSF and the army over their integration during a transition towards democracy, has devastated the country, driving half the population into hunger.

According to Idris, among the signatories to the charter and foundational constitution is powerful rebel leader Abdelaziz al-Hilu who controls vast swathes of territory and troops in South Kordofan state, and who has long demanded that Sudan embrace secularism.

Talks that began earlier this week were hosted in Kenya, drawing condemnation from Sudan and domestic criticism of President William Ruto for plunging the country into a diplomatic melee.