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Al-Sanussi holds key to Yvonne Fletcher death, says PM El-Kib
London, 26 May:
Prime Minister Abdurrahim El-Kib has alleged that Abduallah Al-Senussi, Qaddafi’s . . .[restrict]brother-in-law and former head of intelligence, was “directly or indirectly involved” in the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher, and knew the identity of her killer.
Speaking during an interview with the UK’s Guardian newspaper, El-Kib said of Al-Senussi, “I guarantee he was almost directly or indirectly involved in most if not all of the crimes [of the former regime]. That doesn’t mean others weren’t involved. But he definitely knows who they were.”
When asked if he believed WPC Fletcher’s killer to still be alive and in Libya, El-Kib responded, “I leave this to the investigation”.
Al-Senussi is currently being held in Mauritania, having fled there from Morocco in March this year. The government in Nouakchott is currently considering a request by the Libyan government for his extradition.
Al-Senussi is wanted by a number of jurisdictions for alleged crimes committed over several decades.
In addition to the Yvonne Fletcher case, the British government wants to question Al-Senussi in relation to the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, in which 270 people died.
The French government, meanwhile, want him in for his role in the bombing of a French passenger plane over Chad in 1989, which killed all 171 people on board. He was convicted of this crime in-absentia by a French court in 1999.
In Libya, Al-Senussi is wanted on numerous charges of murder and human rights abuses, perhaps most infamously the 1996 Abu Salim prison massacre, in which more than 1,200 inmates died.
He is also wanted by both the government and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in relation to his involvement in attempting to suppress last year’s pro-democracy uprising.
It is widely believed that new light will be shed on a number of these cases should Al-Senussi be eventually apprehended and tried.
El-Kib has insisted that Al-Senussi will have his day in court: “This person needs to be tried in Libya soon so we can close the books on many of the crimes committed by the past regime”, he said. [/restrict]
