Libyan Militia Leader Says Ready to Reveal Location of Gaddafi’s Grave

 Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi poses after an interview with TRT Turkish television reporter Mehmet Akif Ersoy at the Rixos hotel in Tripoli March 8, 2011. REUTERS/Huseyin Dogan
Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi poses after an interview with TRT Turkish television reporter Mehmet Akif Ersoy at the Rixos hotel in Tripoli March 8, 2011. REUTERS/Huseyin Dogan
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Libyan Militia Leader Says Ready to Reveal Location of Gaddafi’s Grave

 Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi poses after an interview with TRT Turkish television reporter Mehmet Akif Ersoy at the Rixos hotel in Tripoli March 8, 2011. REUTERS/Huseyin Dogan
Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi poses after an interview with TRT Turkish television reporter Mehmet Akif Ersoy at the Rixos hotel in Tripoli March 8, 2011. REUTERS/Huseyin Dogan

A militia leader in the city of Misurata raised the issue of the location of the grave of the late Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi, who was buried there nearly 10 years ago after his arrest and killing.

Salah Badi, the commander of the so-called ‘Al-Samoud Brigade’, one of the participants in the burial of Gaddafi and his son Mutassim, said that he was ready to reveal the place where Gaddafi’s body was buried after his death on Oct. 20, 2011, after a bloody battle in the city of Sirte.

UN-sanctioned Salah Badi, whose forces played a key role in preventing the National Army from entering Tripoli two years ago, was speaking in an interview via Clubhouse about the Feb. 18 revolution, which broke out in 2011, and the following events that led to the overthrow of the regime.

Despite the passing of 10 years since the killing of Gaddafi, some Libyan cities, especially in the south, still express their grief at his loss. His supporters demand to know the location of the grave in which he was buried along with his son, Al-Mutasim Billah, according to a legal case which was previously brought by Libyan lawyer Adnan Argaa Al-Urfi before the Benghazi Court of First Instance.

Supporters of the former regime seemed to disregard Badi’s statements, but one of the Gadhadhfa tribe sheikhs demanded, in a statement to Asharq Al-Awsat, that he should be tried internationally for his crimes, adding that Gaddafi’s burial place must be revealed.

Gaddafi and his son were killed in the city of Sirte. However, people from Misurata took their bodies to their city, before burying them in an unknown location. Since then, supporters of the former regime have launched lawsuits to reveal the burial place, without reaching any concrete response to their quest.



Iraqi Militias Deploy in Syria to Back Govt Counteroffensive against Opposition Factions

A destroyed Syrian army helicopter sits on the tarmac the Nayrab military airport in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on December 2, 2024. (AFP)
A destroyed Syrian army helicopter sits on the tarmac the Nayrab military airport in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on December 2, 2024. (AFP)
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Iraqi Militias Deploy in Syria to Back Govt Counteroffensive against Opposition Factions

A destroyed Syrian army helicopter sits on the tarmac the Nayrab military airport in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on December 2, 2024. (AFP)
A destroyed Syrian army helicopter sits on the tarmac the Nayrab military airport in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on December 2, 2024. (AFP)

Iranian-backed Iraqi militias have deployed in Syria to back the government's counteroffensive against a surprise advance by opposition factions who seized the largest city of Aleppo, a militia official and a war monitor said Monday.

The factions led by the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham launched a two-pronged attack on Aleppo last week and moved into the countryside around Idlib and neighboring Hama province. Government troops built a fortified defensive line in northern Hama in an attempt to stall the fighters’ momentum while jets on Sunday pounded opposition-held lines.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi met with Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus Sunday and announced Tehran's full support for his government. He later arrived for talks in Ankara, Türkiye, one of the opposition’s main backers.

“I clearly announced full-fledged support to President Assad, government, army, and people of Syria by the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Araghchi said. He did not further elaborate but Iran has been of Assad's principal political and military supporters and has deployed military advisers and forces after 2011 protests against Assad’s rule turned into an all-out war.

Tehran-backed Iraqi militias already in Syria mobilized and additional forces crossed the border to support Assad's government and army, said the Iraqi militia official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

According to Britain-based opposition war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, some 200 Iraqi militiamen on pickups crossed into Syria overnight through the strategic al-Boukamal crossing. They were expected to deploy in Aleppo to support the Syrian army’s pushback against the opposition, the monitor said.

Dozens of Iran-aligned Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) fighters from Iraq also crossed into Syria through a military route near al-Boukamal crossing, a senior Syrian army source told Reuters.

"These are fresh reinforcements being sent to aid our comrades on the front lines in the north," the officer said, adding the militias included Iraq's Katiab Hezbollah and Fatemiyoun groups.

Syrian and Russian airstrikes on opposition positions continued mostly in Hama and Idlib provinces. At least 10 civilians were killed in Idlib city and province, according to the Syrian Civil Defense in opposition-held areas.

Syrian Kurds were fleeing the fighting in large numbers after Turkish-backed opposition fighters seized Tel Rifaat from rival US-backed Kurdish authorities.  

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces largely withdrew and called for a humanitarian corridor to allow people to leave safely in convoys toward Aleppo and later to Kurdish-led northeast regions.