Libya has formally requested Lebanon to release Hannibal Gadhafi, the son of the late Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, who has been detained in Lebanon since 2015 without charges and is suffering from a deteriorating health condition due to a hunger strike, officials said on Monday.
According to two Lebanese judicial officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, Libya’s prosecutor general Al-Sediq al-Sour sent a letter earlier this month to his Lebanese counterpart, Ghassan Oueidat, regarding Hannibal Gadhafi’s case. The letter stated that Lebanon’s cooperation in this matter could help reveal the truth about the fate of a prominent Lebanese Shiite cleric, Moussa al-Sadr, who disappeared in Libya in 1978.
The letter also questioned why Hannibal Gadhafi was being held without trial and asked that he be either handed over to Libya or be allowed to return to Syria, where he had been living in exile with his Lebanese wife, Aline Skaf, and children until he was kidnapped and brought to Lebanon eight years ago.
The Lebanese prosecutor then referred the case to Zaher Hamadeh, the investigative judge in charge of the missing cleric’s case, who is studying the Libyan request and will respond in due time.
Hannibal Gadhafi has been in custody in Lebanon since 2015 after he was abducted by Lebanese militants who demanded information on the whereabouts of al-Sadr. Lebanese police later announced that they had picked up Gadhafi from the city of Baalbek in northeastern Lebanon, where he was being held by his captors.
Al-Sadr’s Disappearance
The disappearance of al-Sadr in 1978 has been a long-standing sore point in Lebanon. The cleric was the founder of the Amal group, a Shiite political and military movement that later fought in Lebanon’s 1975-90 civil war. Lebanon’s powerful parliament speaker Nabih Berri is the head of the group.
The cleric’s family believes that he may still be alive in a Libyan prison, though most Lebanese presume that he is dead. He would be 94 years old if he were alive. Most of al-Sadr’s followers are convinced that Moammar Gadhafi ordered al-Sadr killed in a dispute over Libyan payments to Lebanese militias.
The health of Hannibal Gadhafi has been deteriorating since he went on hunger strike on June 3, to protest his detention without trial. He was taken to hospital at least twice since then and has been only drinking small amounts of water. His lawyer, Bushra al-Khalil, said that he suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and kidney problems and that his life is in danger.
Al-Khalil also said that Hannibal Gadhafi has nothing to do with al-Sadr’s disappearance and that he was only four years old when the cleric went missing. She accused Lebanon of violating his human rights and holding him as a political hostage.
Libya has been mired in chaos and violence since the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed Moammar Gadhafi. The country is now split between rival authorities based in Tripoli and Tobruk, backed by different foreign powers. The United Nations has been trying to mediate a political settlement and hold elections by the end of this year.
