Fighters want to try Gaddafi’s son

While the International Criminal Court wants Libya to hand over Muammar Gaddafi’s son for trial, Tripoli remains unable to prize him out of the hands of the militia fighters who caught him last year.

Thursday, April 12, 2012
Saif al-Islam is to be put on trial on charges of financial corruption, murder and rape. Net Photo.

While the International Criminal Court wants Libya to hand over Muammar Gaddafi’s son for trial, Tripoli remains unable to prize him out of the hands of the militia fighters who caught him last year.That’s an obstacle the government is trying to overcome as it works to show that the country can give Saif al-Islam Gaddafi a trial that meets international standards, the man overseeing the case for the Libyan authorities said on Wednesday.Libya’s government wants to transfer Saif al-Islam to the capital and put him on trial there rather than transfer him to the International Criminal Court (ICC).Ahmed al-Jehani, the Libyan lawyer in charge of the Saif al-Islam case and who liaises between the Libyan government and the ICC, said that the Zintan fighters who captured and hold Saif al-Islam in a secret prison in Zintan want him tried locally. "Some of the Zintanis want to try Saif in Zintan,” al-Jehani told Reuters on Wednesday. "Some of them say if he is handed over to Tripoli he may escape or he will be helped to escape.”He said the Libyan government was trying to reason with the fighters by reminding them that they would be doing a disservice to Libya if they didn’t hand Saif al-Islam over."We are trying to convince Zintanis at this point that they didn’t fight and sacrifice all this for Zintan, they did it for Libya,” said al-Jehani. "And we have found some who are willing to listen.”But Zintan local council spokesman Khaled al-Zintani told Reuters that some in his city - and indeed across Libya - don’t trust the weak central government because security is still a problem in the country.