TRIPOLI, Sept 5, 2012 (AFP)
Two senior Libyan officials from the ousted regime of Moamer Kadhafi will go on trial next week for financial crimes, the deputy prosecutor told AFP on Wednesday.
“Former foreign minister Abdellati al-Obeidi and ex-parliament speaker Belgassem al-Zwai will stand trial on September 10 for financial crimes that preceded the February 17 (2011) revolution,” Taha Baara said.
Baara said the two were were also being questioned over their alleged implication in suppressing the revolution.
The authorities have said they will bring to justice several henchmen of the former dictator who was captured and killed in October, including Kadhafi’s son, Seif al-Islam, who is jailed inside the country.
Authorities have said Seif will stand trial in September but no exact date has been announced.
“We are still waiting for the charge sheets against Seif al-Islam to be validated by the prosecutor general. It should be done in the next two days,” Baraa said.
Another senior official expected to be brought to trial is former spy chief Abdullah al-Senussi, who was arrested in Mauritania after entering the country illegally earlier this year.
On Wednesday, state television in Nouakchott said Mauritanian authorities had handed Senussi over to Libyan authorities. Later an official source confirmed, on condition of anonymity, that the ex-spymaster “effectively left Mauritania.”
There was no immediate confirmation in Tripoli.
Senussi and Seif al-Islam are also wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.
The ex-spy chief is also wanted by France in connection with the bombing of a French UTA airliner over Niger in September 1989.
The first trial of a senior official accused of killing demonstrators in the uprising against Kadhafi opened in June, when former foreign intelligence chief Bouzid Dorda appeared in a Tripoli court.
