The Criminal Role of Saudi Arabia and UAE
Mahmoud Refaat
War crimes and crimes against humanity have been perpetrated by the belligerents in Libya and continue to make victims. It is necessary to conduct thorough investigations into the actions of Haftar and his seconds, who participated in massacres of civilians, such as in Tarhunah. These individuals must be prosecuted and convicted.
PART (II)
1.3 Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF)
LAAF is supporting the militias, armed groups and the belligerent countries with impunity for violations of international humanitarian law, including possible war crimes.
They fought between the national government loyal to the capital Tripoli and troops in other cities in western Libya. The GNA Agreement and the Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF) caused civilian casualties, mass displacement, and destruction of civilian infrastructure, including hospitals.
Countries such as Turkey, Russia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have violated the UN arms embargo 2 and continue to provide their allies with weapons and military equipment, including prohibited anti-personnel landmines.
Thousands of people have been detained arbitrarily without trial or opportunity. Questioning the legality of their detention, militias and armed groups have kidnapped people, including protesters, journalists, doctors, government officials, and civil society activists based on their real or perceived politics, regional or tribal affiliation, and nationality, taking hostages for ransom; women, girls and members of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and bisexual communities continue to face discrimination and violence.
Minority people strive to obtain adequate health care and other basic services. Officials, armed groups, militias, and members of criminal groups systematically subject refugees, asylum seekers and detained immigrants to torture and other abuse, illegal killings, forced labour, human rights violation etc.
1.4 UAE’s Attack on Refugees
A confidential investigation by the BBC 3 Arab Company into the United Nations revealed that a fighter jet from abroad launched a deadly missile attack at an immigration detention facility in Libya. The country has not been named, but a source familiar with the investigation said it has become the target of the attack.
In the July attack, 53 immigrants were killed and 130 wounded. A UN official believed this was a possible war crime. Most of the people killed in the Tajura detention center. To the east of the capital Tripoli, they are said to have originated in sub-Saharan Africa and tried to reach Europe from Libya.
This is the highest publicly announced death toll in the attack since the Libyan National Army (LNA) launched a new offensive in April. The Tripoli National Assembly government supported by the United Nations. The then UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michel Bachelet said that depending on the circumstances, the attack may be a war crime.
The Special Mission in Libya told the BBC that it provided the coordinates of the immigration centre. Preventing this situation In July, the NTC announced that the attack was carried out by a fighter in the United Arab Emirates. Although it initially bombed a legitimate target but later denied involvement.
1.5 Deadly Drone Strike in Libya
The BBC 4 found new evidence that UAE drones killed 26 unarmed students at a military academy in Tripoli, the capital of Libya, in January 2020.
The so-called Libyan National Army denied responsibility for the attack and suggested that the students were killed by a local bomb. However, there is evidence that the students were hit by a Chinese Blue Arrow 7 missile launched by a drone named “Yonglong II”. Investigations by the BBC Africa Eye and the BBC Arab documentary also found out that “Yonglong” was only Evidence of Type II unmanned aircraft. The attack took off from Al-Khadim Air Force Base in Libya.
The UAE provided and operated drones stationed here. Shortly after 9 pm on January 4, 2020, about 50 cadets conducted routine exercises at a military academy in southern Tripoli. Due to drone air strike on schools in Libya, 26 students died.
Many of them were still teenagers andthey are unarmed. One of the survivors was 20-year-old Abdul Moin. He was in the college when the coup took place. He told the BBC: “It’s simply indescribable.” “We saw our colleague die and gave one last breath. We can’t do anything some people have their torsos separated from them.
This is a terrible crime. It has nothing to do with human beings.” Seven months after the attack, no one admitted that they were responsible for the killing of these youths.
The press has been told that the explosion might have been caused by mortar shells fired on the spot or an attack inside the academy.
1.6 Targets Social Media Users and Journalists
Police and armed groups continue to harass social media users and journalists through detentions, arbitrary arrests and threats of criticism or completion of work.
Police in Tripoli and Misrata parked their cars at the checkpoint, forced residents to unlock their phones and arrested them. In July, a military court in eastern Libya convicted reporter Ismail Buzriba al-Zuei guilty of “terrorism” and was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his media work and criticism of LAAF.
In addition, in August, the Navassi militia, nominally belonging to the GNA Ministry of Interior, kidnapped Sami al-Sherif, a TV news reporter, and detained him in a secret location for 11 days to cover up the protests in Tripoli.
1.7 Violence against Women
As the authorities did not provide any compensation or protection, girls and women has been subjected to gender and sexual based violence by non-state actors and the government.
Women and girls face legal barriers with rape and other forms of sexual violence, including the risk of prosecution for extramarital sex criminalized in Libya and the risk of retaliation by suspects.
Activists and politicians face gender-specific threats and online violence for instance, in April, members of al-Qaeda armed groups kidnapped at least four women, possibly in retaliation for the public shooting of lawyer Hanan al-Barassi by unidentified militants in Benghazi in November when they posted it on social media.
Continue to face discrimination in law and practice, including issues related to marriage, divorce and inheritance. In October, the Supreme Judicial Council of Libya appointed five judges to two newly established special courts in Tripoli and Benghazi to handle cases of violence against women and children. The court closed at the end of the year.
Obviously, the eastern part of the country is a restricted zone for journalists, and the situation has not improved. In February 2017, a self-proclaimed Libyan National Army spokesperson announced that all women that were between and 45 years old. In 2014, Salva Bugaigis, a well-known lawyer and senator, was shot dead at his home in Benghazi.
In a series of murders and disappearances of women active in political activities, she is the most obvious victim. Heba Morayef of Amnesty International said in a report released earlier this year:
“The murder of Salva Bugaigis marks the hope of Libyan women after the uprising. Active participation in the turning point of public and political life. 2011″ pointed out: “Gender-based violence against women continues to escalate, and these women continue to fight for political integration.”
As the Sarafians continue to gain strength in the political structure, this has resulted in increased difficulty in being a women. In religious beliefs, men don’t even want Asma Khalifa, the co-founder of the Tamakigut Women’s Movement, to say on the phone, don’t think of yourself as a “feminist” .
The civil war that overthrew the Libyan dictator Gaddafi gave the country’s women a foothold in public life. Now they are being crushed and even killed. Fatma al Omrani said that she had always wanted to be a journalist, but it was over.
The reason for studying accounting is that women in the media under the rule of Dictator Muammar Gaddafi enjoy the reputation of being “loyal to the regime.” Women or other people have no freedom of speech,” said a 28-year-old DW man in the coastal city of Zuwara, which borders Tunisia in western Libya.
1.8 Deprivation of Liberty and Arbitrary Detention
Security forces, armed groups and Militias continue to arbitrarily detain millions of people without trail or charge, some for up to a decade. The NTC announced the release of approximately 2000 inmates who may have had a COVID-19 infection in prison.
At least 10 people from Maharba, the LAAF-controlled city of Ajdabiya, were kidnapped and arrested for working with the imprisoned former oil service chief IbrahimJadran has family relationships, which have also suffered.
Dozens of people were arrested. In less than a year, the family was arbitrarily detained for many years without trial in Mitiga Prison in Tripoli, under the control of the Rada Forces and the nominal PNS.
They won several protests and requested his release. Multinational companies such as the Special Containment Forces (radar forces), the Bab Tajura Brigade, al-Nawassi, the Abu Selim Brigade and the Al-Zawiya First Support Force are illegal.
1.9 Treatment and Torture
Armed groups have systematically ill-treated and tortured prisoners in informal and official places of detention with impunity, subjecting them to beatings, electric shocks, mock executions, arrests and sexual assaults.
Activists say that violence involving multinational militias and air force armed groups spread on social media in January, May and September. In July, 30-year-old Tarek Abdelhafiz was tortured by the detention of the 128th Brigade, an armed group of the US Air Force, 14 days ago Arrested in Hon City.
In August, members of the Navassi militia and armed groups from LAAF beat up several people detained in connection with the protests in Tripoli and Margi.
1.10 Battle over Blockage of Oil
The NOC accused the UAE of instructing Eastern forces to block oil exports again after the first tanker evacuated within six months during the civil war in Libya.
Reported by the Libyan National Army, even though the tanker is stored in Libya, but the blockade will continue. The hostile forces between Tripoli and Haftar in the east of the UN-approved National Assembly government were torn apart.
The company said in a statement on Sunday: “National Petroleum Corporation has been informed that the United Arab Emirates has ordered the cessation of LNA production.” After the GNA gained momentum, NOC also tried to resume production in the Sharara oil field, but said its efforts soon stopped.
On Friday, the tanker Vitol Kriti Bastion called at the port of Es Sider and invited him. He set sail on Saturday. Since the blockade, Libya implemented its first legal oil export in January.
Fight with Syrian mercenaries against the currently occupied LNA Es Side. According to international agreements, only Norwegian kroner can extract and export oil, and the proceeds must be transferred to the Central Bank of Libya.
It said on Saturday that the blockade will continue until a series of conditions are met, including the transfer of oil revenues to new bank accounts abroad, which are then distributed to various regions.
The US Embassy in Libya said on Sunday that the blockade was restored after “a few days of intense diplomatic activities” to allow the Olympic Committee to resume production and said it “regrets that foreign-supported efforts have hindered the effort.”
There has always been a lack of reconciliation between the two hostile governments in Tripoli and Tobruk, which split the oil infrastructure and the oil terminal is controlled by hostile government groups and militias.
The national oil company has legal control over Libya’s oil resources and exports. Since 2014, his competitor NOC East has been stationed in Benghazi. During the conflict, it remained neutral, and his control of oil exports was hindered.
NOC East seeks international recognition and strives to sign development contracts with the company. Disputes broke out between rival national oil companies that led to the blockade of the port of Marsa al-Hariga for three weeks, resulting in a drop in oil production to 200,000 barrels per day.
In July 2016, competitor NOC agreed to the joint oil sector. Both NOC factions agreed that the leader of the NOC in Tripoli, Mustafa Sanallah, would take over as the president, and the leader of the NOC of the East, Naji al-Magrabi, would come to power and become a member of the board of directors.
In 2016, PK signed an agreement with Ibrahim Jadran, the former head of the Libyan Central Petroleum Facility Guard, to reopen the Sidrah and Ras Lanuf stations that Jadran had controlled since 2013, and block Made sales in about US dollars.
The GNC in Tripoli was unable to regain control of the oil station. This allowed LNA, under the leadership of Haftar, to occupy the oil ports of Sidra, Ras Lanuf, and Buraik, and supply oil through the integration of NOC.
NOC President Mustafa Sanallah has suspended foreign investment in the oil sector. The country increased its daily output to 1 million barrels in July 2017, but Jafran. However,with the help of the United Emirates, Jadran’s attempt was thwarted. Who managed to catch him? However, after LNA gained control, it decided to transfer control to NOC East.
Although it was unified in 2016, it still exists in Benghazi. However, due to international pressure, Haftar succumbed and handed over the oil terminal at NOC Tripoli on July 11, 2018. Nonetheless, the control conflict between the port and the oil terminal continues.
Recently, on February 11, 2019, Tuareg Alli from Haftar extended control of the largest confiscated oil field, El Sharara. Since December 8, 2018, tribal groups, armed protesters and the National Guard have called for salaries and development funds.
The UAE believes that the strategic merger of Haftar’s main oil fields is a welcome change, and international investment in Libya’s oil sector is also increasing. During this period, the control of the Libyan oil market and the rise of world oil prices.
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Mahmoud Refaat is an expert in international law, politician and writer. Refaat is the president of the European Institute for International Law and International Relations in Brussels, Belgium.
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