Group of Qaddafi officials reaches Niger Alarabiya – Agencies
While Niger announced that another 14 Muammar Qaddafi officials have crossed its border, Interpol issued arrest warrants for Libya’s strongman, his son Seif al-Islam and intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senussi, it said in a statement on Friday. “As far as Interpol’s general secretariat headquarters is concerned, Muammar Qaddafi is a fugitive whose country of nationality and the ICC want arrested and held accountable for the serious criminal charges that have been brought against him,” Reuters reported Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble as saying. Interpol, the world police body, called for the arrest of the fugitive former Libyan leader for his alleged crimes against humanity, following a request by the International Criminal Court prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo. Interpol also asked its 188 member countries “to take all measures consistent with their national laws to help the ICC locate and apprehend Qaddafi.” ICC judges on June 27 agreed to Moreno-Ocampo’s request for arrest warrants against Kadhafi, 69, Seif al-Islam, 39 and Senussi, 62, for crimes against humanity committed by Libyan troops on their orders, using “lethal force” to quell the uprising against his regime. Qaddafi officials in Niger Meanwhile, a new group of 14 Qaddafi officials including General Ali Kana, a Tuareg who was one of Qaddafi’s close guards in charge of his southern troops, are in Niger’s northern city of Agadez, Niger security sources told Reuters on Friday. Two sources said the group included four top officials, amongst them two generals. The identity of the other general has not been confirmed. A Reuters reporter in Agadez said the four top officials were staying at a hotel in Agadez owned by Qaddafi. “The group arrived in four four-wheel-drive vehicles on Thursday afternoon,” one of the sources said, adding that they were accompanied by Nigerien security forces. Niger’s government was not available for comment on Friday morning. The arrival of the group follows that of the head of Qaddafi’s security brigades, Mansour Dhao, who crossed into Niger in a convoy on Monday. Niger has said it had allowed the Libyans into its territory on humanitarian grounds but has come under pressure from the international community to hand over former Qaddafi officials suspected of human rights abuses.
