Tripoli, 8 October 2013:
The UN Special Representative in Libya, Tarek Mitri, has criticised the kidnapping of Nazih Al-Ruqaii, alias Abu Anas . . .[restrict]Al-Libi, on a Tripoli street on Saturday at the behest of the Americans.
The government of Libya and the Libyan people, he said, “have every right to know the circumstances of the abduction . . . and to demand full respect for international and national laws”.
National sovereignty was an important and “sensitive” issue in Libya, Mitri stressed. There was also the need “to safeguard the right of all accused persons to a fair treatment and trial”.
In a sharp reproach of the US action, he said that all those members of the international community who had stood by the Libyan revolution had to now redouble their efforts in assisting Libya build a sovereign state – “based on the rule of law”.
Meanwhile today, the Justice Minister, Salah Marghani, summoned US ambassador Deborah Jones to explain the abduction of Ruqaii.
He too stressed that fact that the Libyan authorities had known nothing about it – not only himself, but the Prime Minister as well. “I haven’t seen anyone more surprised than Ali Zeidan about what happened,” he told the media after his meeting.
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