‘Despicable & inhumane’: Gaddafi son’s interrogators threaten sexual abuse with 23mm gun bullet

A newly leaked interrogation video of Muammar Gaddafi’s son Saadi has revealed mistreatment and threats of sexual abuse during his questioning, which his mother has called despicable and contrary to every individual’s right to be treated with dignity.

In the latest footage, released by the Arabic Clear News outlet, the interrogators can be heard threatening the blindfolded prisoner with violence and sexual abuse.

“You can talk by yourself or our guys will make you sit on a bullet from a 23mm gun so we will have all the information,” one of the jailers heard telling the main identified earlier as former Libyan leader’s son Saadi.

“Try to keep your manhood and not get it violated,” said another one, refusing the prisoner’s request to remove his blindfold.

The interrogators also told the prisoner, “there [were] no human rights here for [Saadi],” telling him that when they questioned Gaddafi former intelligence chief, Abdullah Senussi, his “ribs were broken … and we beat him senseless.”

Being asked about his connections to various groups, the prisoner said he was too afraid to disclose any information concerning this issue fearing reprisals. “They will hurt me. I swear to God they will hurt me,” he said without identifying who posed a potential threat for him.

‘Prisoners are well treated’

Tripoli security officials have not yet commented on the new footage which emerged amid the officials’ claims that the prisoners in their custody have been treated well. The state prosecutors also launched a probe into the torture allegations and have been trying to identify the guards shown in the previous video released two weeks ago.

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The Tripoli government even invited journalists to see Saadi in his cell and to speak to him in order to prove he had not been tortured. Saadi told Reuters he was in good condition, although he claimed to be not guilty and insisted to be released.

“Everything is okay in the prison. They treat me well. I am asking the officials to release me because I am not guilty,” he said in the presence of officials from Tripoli government – one of the two rival administrations wrestling for power amid chaos that engulfed Libya following the NATO intervention that helped depose Colonel Gaddafi.

‘No mother should have to watch her son being treated in this manner’

Meanwhile Muammar Gaddafi’s widow and Saadi Gaddafi’s mother, Safia Farkash, issued a statement on Thursday strongly condemning torture and threats against her son in prison, calling them “a despicable abuse” that was “contrary to every individual’s right to be treated humanely and with dignity.”

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She also criticized the Libyan government and the UN for their inaction, as neither of them answered her requests to “protect her son from mistreatment.”

“I repeatedly called on the United Nations, the Libyan authorities and NGOs to do everything they can to protect my son… But my pleas were not answered,” she said in the statement.

“No detainee should be abused and threatened by the guards, who are supposed to protect them… who are supposed to present law and order… [this] is a crime against all notions of humanity,” she added.

Safia Farkash ended her statement with a call on the United Nations and the Libyan government to take “immediate steps to ensure Al-Saadi’s protection and the protection of all the other sons of Libyan mothers who are detained with him.”

Saadi Gaddafi has been kept in Tripoli's Hadba prison in pretrial detention since his extradition from Niger to Libya in March 2014 on charges over the alleged killing of a football player which took place when he had been the head of the Libyan football federation. He is also charged with other crimes associated with his father’s rule.

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Last month, a Tripoli court sentenced another son of Muammar Gaddafi, Saif al-Islam to death in absentia, alongside with eight other former Gaddafi officials including former intelligence chief Senussi and ex-prime minister Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi, who are awaiting sentence confirmation from the Supreme Court.

Following the same court verdict, 23 more former officials received different terms of imprisonment raging from five years to life in prison.