Refugee's justice hopes ‘crushed' after Italy releases Libya war crimes suspect
A man who says he experienced abuses at a notorious prison in Tripoli at the hands of the head of Libya's judicial police, Osama Najim, has said Italy has 'crushed' his hopes for justice by releasing the war crimes suspect despite an international criminal court arrest warrant.
David Yambio was held at Mitiga prison in Tripoli after several attempts to cross the Mediterranean in search of refuge in Europe were thwarted by Libya's coastguard as part of a controversial pact with Italy.
Najim is believed to have been in charge of prison facilities in Tripoli, including Mitiga, since February 2015. The former warlord, also known as Almasri, was arrested in Turin last week on the warrant issued by the ICC before being unexpectedly released on a technicality and swiftly repatriated to a hero's welcome.
'The fragile hope for justice that we were all holding on to has been crushed,' Yambio said in an interview with the Guardian.
The 27-year-old, who now lives in Italy and is the co-founder of the NGO Refugees in Libya, is among the many refugees and migrants who provided testimony to the ICC about Najim. The court wants him for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, as well as alleged rape and murder committed at Mitiga.
Yambio said: 'Almasri was in Italy, in my backyard … heaven knows if he was looking for me and all those who witnessed his [alleged] crimes. We already live in perpetual fear, but how can we be safe in a country that pretended to keep us safe and instead protects an [alleged] torturer? I'm struggling to reconcile what has happened. All we have left is our voice and even that is being attacked by people who want to deny our pain.'
Italy's interior minister, Matteo Piantedosi, said Najim had been sent back because he 'presented a profile of social dangerousness'. On Monday the UN mission in Libya called for authorities there to arrest him. Libya does not recognise the ICC, but has cooperated with its prosecutor, Karim Khan, on some cases recently.
Yambio fled civil war in South Sudan and travelled to Libya in preparation for the journey across the Mediterranean, a perilous crossing that thousands of people risk each year in a desperate quest to reach Europe.
Since 2017, Italy has trained and funded the Libyan coastguard to capture people in the Mediterranean and bring them back to the north African country. The deal, approved by the European Council, has long been condemned by humanitarian groups for pushing people back to detention camps where they face torture and other abuses.
'This deal is a death sentence,' said Yambio. 'Innumerable people have been killed by this process either by being taken back from the Mediterranean or by being put in detention centres or dumped in the desert. So the experience that me and others have experienced, or are still experiencing, is not the entire doing of the Libyans. Italy is complicit and has blood on its hands.'
Yambio said he first encountered Najim during his detention at al-Jadida prison in 2019 before being moved to Mitiga, a facility condemned by human rights organisations for its arbitrary detention, torture and abuse of political dissidents, migrants and refugees.
Yambio, who was used as forced labour on the construction of a new prison and to load heavy weaponry on to trucks, described systematic abuse against himself and other detainees allegedly at the hands of Najim and his guards.
Yambio claimed that Najim whipped him with a water pipe and ordered whippings or beatings by guards wielding AK-47s whenever he made an error on site, usually due to extreme tiredness and hunger. 'It was his habit, anyone who he came across – maybe you were having a rest, maybe a brick fell on your feet – he would rush to you and whip you,' he alleged.
Yambio managed to escape from the prison in 2020, climbing over a 5-metre wall in the middle of the night and hiding out in Libya before successfully making it to Italy by boat in June 2022. Yambio, whose asylum application was accepted after he arrived in Italy, said several requests made by him while in Libya were rejected.
Apart from migration, Italy has other wide-ranging political and businesses interests in Libya, its former colony. The Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, has travelled to the country four times since coming to power in October 2022.
Italy has also signed several investment and development deals with Libya as part of Meloni's much-touted Mattei plan, aimed at increasing European cooperation on the African continent in return for curbs on irregular migration.
Yambio, who is also an activist with the German NGO Sea-Watch, said the Refugees in Libya group was made up of about 200 people. 'Most of us are in Europe, but many are still in Libya,' he said. 'The idea is to challenge the narratives, and reveal what is really happening in Libya and who is responsible.'
The Guardian has called and written to Libya's judicial police authority with a request for comment. The authority last week wrote in a Facebook post that Najim's arrest was an 'outrageous incident'.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Pembrokeshire Herald
6 hours ago
- Pembrokeshire Herald
Cabinet approves transport strategy wish list
PEMBROKESHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL'S Cabinet has endorsed a Regional Transport Strategy that relies on Welsh Government funding of £125m over the next five years. However, the plan also relies on the Council spending other money allocated to it by the Welsh Government to pay for the delivery of Welsh Government as well as local priorities. Based on comparisons between similar projects, the low end of the cost of delivering the Pembrokeshire-only projects will be at least £66m. That suggests that not only will all the projects not come to fruition in the plan period but also indicates that the Welsh Government funding allocation to them underestimates the cost of delivering the majority, if not all, of the projects. If the strategy's budget is fantasy, the prospects of delivering all of it are even more fanciful. The projects in the strategy read like a Guardian reader's wishlist instead of something grounded in local needs. ACTIVE TRAVEL SCHEMES DOMINATE The thirty-plus projects located solely in Pembrokeshire include fifteen schemes solely dedicated to active travel or which incorporate active travel as part of them. In context, and based on the cost of delivering similar schemes, the low-end estimate for 'active travel' schemes alone is around £22m. 'Active Travel' under the Welsh Government's Active Travel Act refers to efforts to reduce the use of cars for everyday journeys, such as commuting and education. Active travel schemes create infrastructure which supports walking, cycling, and wheeling (e.g., wheelchairs, mobility scooters). Those schemes work well in urban areas. However, in rural areas with dispersed working populations, such as Pembrokeshire, their impact is less beneficial. The now-former Welsh Government minister Lee Waters got an earful from Plaid Cymru and fringe environmental groups (mostly funded by the Welsh Government) when he dared say that cars would continue to be the primary mode of transportation in rural Wales. If an MS from Dolgellau can use an e-scooter to get the mile and a half from their taxpayer-funded flat in Cardiff to the Senedd, there's evidently no reason why commuters between Fishguard and Haverfordwest can't do the same. The active travel schemes planned for Pembrokeshire include a Multi-User Route from Narberth to Haverfordwest, an active travel route from Pembroke Dock to Pennar, one from Pembroke to Angle, six schemes in and around Tenby, and an expansion of the County Council's e-bike scheme. BIG TICKET SPENDING The big spending item is the relocation of the A487 at Newgale. That project has been on the cards for fourteen years, if not longer. It forms part of the Welsh Government's regional transport strategy as a permanent solution to the challenge of coastal erosion and the increased risks of tidal and pluvial flooding, standing against less certain and temporary interventions to hold the existing line. As it is part of the Regional Strategy, it will be predominantly funded by the Welsh Government through project-specific grants, in the same way as the preliminary investigations and public engagement. The plan will funnel transport funding towards supporting the Celtic Sea Freeport. Its backers hope the Freeport's economic impact will be positive and spread across the Freeport area. However, the existing transport infrastructure for it is a bad joke. Addressing its shortcomings is a major component of the Regional Transport Strategy. Setting aside projects scheduled for Neath Port Talbot, millions of pounds are projected to be spent on hydrogen fuel infrastructure and green/blue energy grid improvements. However, one project guaranteed to cause controversy seeks to increase road capacity and flow through Pembroke to support increased traffic from the Celtic Freeport development in the Angle Peninsula. Bearing in mind obvious geographical and logistical constraints and its need to cross conservation areas and sensitive landscapes within the National Park, any road expansion (there's also an active travel route planned) will likely cause uproar and cost tens of millions to deliver. That is, however, a long-term project. MORE TRANSPORT HUBS In the medium term, the Regional Strategy looks at a multi-million-pound project to improve roads between Haverfordwest and Milford Haven. That scheme looks to address congestion between the county town and the centre of Freeport operations in Pembrokeshire. Again, geographical and logistical issues suggest that the project will find it difficult to do much more than put lipstick on a pig. If, however, the scheme manages to resolve the congestion hotspots at Cartlett, Salutation Square (subject to a separate congestion-easing plan), Freemen's Way, and Johnston as far as the Sunnycroft Roundabout, it will doubtless be welcomed by commuters. And, if you thought one transport hub was a bad idea, there's more to come – from the Milford Haven transport interchange to one planned for Pembroke Dock, improved access to Fishguard's ferry port, and a host of other projects that will connect Pembrokeshire's public transport network, as the plan puts it poetically 'ensuring better multimodal connectivity'. Given the almost certain budget problems which these projects will encounter and, therefore, cause the County Council when it comes to setting its budgets, ensuring Pembrokeshire gets what it needs to improve the local economy instead of what the Welsh Government thinks it ought to have will be a major source of tension and contention. If half of the plan is delivered on time, on budget, and within the Welsh Government's funding envelope, its effects will be limited – as we will all have pigs to fly around on.
New Statesman
a day ago
- New Statesman
James Cleverly's shadow Tory leadership bid heats up
Photo byIs James Cleverly making another bid for the Conservative leadership? That's certainly how his speech at the Conservative Environment Network's Sam Barker Memorial Lecture on Wednesday night, in which he talked about 'rejecting both the Luddite left and the Luddite right', has been interpreted by Tory watchers. 'James Cleverly takes on Kemi Badenoch over decision to ditch net zero targets', read the Guardian headline. The Mail went with 'Kemi Badenoch faces Net Zero revolt as Tory big beast James Cleverly warns her to ignore climate change 'luddites''. The Telegraph, meanwhile, wrote it up as 'Former home secretary directly challenges Kemi Badenoch on net zero'. Cleverly himself has pushed back hard against the suggestion that his speech was in any way a rebuke of the current Tory leader, calling it 'fake news'. In a punchy Twitter thread, he pointed out that he never once mentioned the term 'net zero' in the speech (he also didn't mention Badenoch), and claimed protecting the environment ('like Margaret Thatcher once did') was 'in our economic and security interests'. Indeed, the text of the speech itself was far more about foreign policy (in particular the threat of Chinese dominance and mass migration caused by climate change) than it was about carbon emission targets. But the fractured state of the Conservative party is such that any intervention from a high-profile figure will be read as a tacit (or not so tacit) criticism of Kemi Badenoch's leadership and attempt at positioning to be her successor. That applies to Cleverly's environmental speech just as much as it applies to Robert Jenrick's viral videos on confronting fare-dodgers on the London Underground. It is the latter who has drawn the most attention in the seven months since Badenoch became leader. Partly, this is due to the fact that Jenrick was the runner-up, after a mix-up over vote-swapping meant Cleverly was knocked up before he had the chance to face the membership. Partly it's down to Jenrick's place in the shadow cabinet, whereas Cleverly has taken a break from frontbench politics. And partly it's to do with visibility – once dubbed 'a very ambitious blur' by Andrew Marr, no one watching Jenrick's frenetic activity in opposition has any doubt that he still covets the top job. Jenrick's stance, in the leadership contest and since, has been to shift rightwards and attempt to neutralise Nigel Farage by moving onto Reform's turf. But as the Tory party grapples with having to rebuild from an election calamity that saw it lose hundreds of seats to Labour and the Liberal Democrats, Cleverly's name is increasingly being whispered by moderate Conservatives anxious about both the polls and the Reform-wards tilt. Cleverly's positioning as the 'One Nation' candidate in the 2024 leadership race came as something of a surprise to those close to him. A Brexit-backer first appointed to the role of foreign secretary by Liz Truss, he assumed the role of the moderates' champion almost by default, with both Jenrick and Badenoch running from the right. One friend in the party described his politics as 'to the left of Kemi, but not by much – his heroes are Thatcher and Regan', and called the One Nation label 'grossly simplistic'. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe But it is true that Cleverly saw himself as a unifier, someone who could bring different strands of the party together after its worst ever defeat and who understood that parties can only win by building a broad coalition of support. Another ally said his pitch to the membership, had he got to that stage, would have been to argue there is more mileage in listening to voters who abandoned the Conservatives over concerns about competence and values rather than chasing people who have found a new home in Reform. At the time, the received consensus was that Tory members always pick the more right-wing candidate of the pair offered to them and would do again. That consensus is the reason Jenrick is the now bookies' favourite, seen as the likeliest successor to Badenoch. But something interesting may be happening to the Conservative membership. Tory members are notoriously hard to poll (we don't even know how many there are), but Reform now claims to have over 200,000. A substantial chunk of these are understood to be former Tories who have quit the party since the 2024 election. That will inevitably have shifted the internal dynamics among those who remain, perhaps to the extent that more moderate members – those repelled by Farage who find Jenrick's talk of some kind of pact with Reform anathema – now hold the majority. A Cleverly candidacy now, I was told by an active member in one local association, would have a much higher chance of success than in autumn 2024. (Others have different perspectives.) The parliamentary party too is more nuanced than current narratives about the Tories' rightwards tilt suggest. In the penultimate round of MP voting, the two candidates coded as more centrist – Cleverly and Tom Tugendhat – received 59 votes together; Jenrick and Badenoch got a combined 61. (On the environmental front, the Conservative climate caucus in parliament boasts 49 MPs.) A former Tory MP referred to the remaining One Nation cohort as the 'sleeping giant' of the Conservative party – a group that, were it to band together, could be a serious force in parliament. It will not have escaped their notice that the Tories are spiralling situation under Badenoch. A poll last month put the Conservatives fourth – below Reform, Labour and the Lib Dems – on a popularity level not seen since 2019 and Theresa May's Brexit deadlock. One Tory insider called the figures 'extinction-level'. Some Conservatives are getting desperate: rumours are swirling of various plots to oust Badenoch, possibly even before her year's grace period as leader is up in November. A Survation poll last week suggested 60 per cent of 2024 Conservative voters thought bringing back Boris Johnson would be better than keeping Badenoch as leader. Against this backdrop, any signs of dissent are being seized upon. Earlier this week, eight Tory MPs (including Father of the House Edward Leigh) wrote to Keir Starmer saying they would support him if the government were to move to recognise a Palestinian state – another move interpreted as an attempt to 'defy' Badenoch. Cleverly gave his Conservative Environment Network speech the following day, and was similarly read as a rebuke. The rumour persists that a coup is just around the corner, and every intervention plays into that narrative. Any hint of a Cleverly revival, however, should be tempered with a few caveats, both personal and political. His wife Susie, who is herself much loved in Conservative circles, came through a difficult battle with an aggressive form of breast cancer two years ago, which would caution anyone considering what's widely considered one of the worst jobs in politics to think twice. 'I'm not sure he's really been able to be in that headspace,' was the assessment of one friend. More generally, while frustration with Badenoch is growing, even her fiercest critics acknowledge that changing leaders yet again would do 'irreparable damage' to the already wounded party and be 'a colossal act of self-harm'. And that's without taking into considering how difficult it is to rebuild so soon after an election. One former MP who lost their seat in July put it bluntly: 'She's doing an impossible job badly.' Even Jenrick, for all his obvious ambition, doesn't want a leadership challenge now. His video efforts are aimed firmly at attacking Labour figures (Keir Starmer, Richard Hermer, Sadiq Khan). Yes they can be viewed obliquely as presenting an alternative pattern for leadership, but it isn't Badenoch in the direct crosshairs. Axing a leader so soon would fuel Labour and Reform narratives that the Tory party is too dysfunctional to be taken seriously, and the new leader – whether Jenrick, Cleverly, or someone else entirely – would be facing the exact same challenges and the same uphill battle. Boris Johnson has in past years likened himself to Cincinnatus, the Roman statesman who 'returned to his plough' after leading the state at a time of crisis and was then called back to assume power a second time. But years before that the then London mayor described his ambition to be PM with the line that 'Obviously, if the ball came loose from the back of a scrum – which it won't – it would be a great, great thing to have a crack at.' A passionate rugby fan himself, this was the comparison made by several people close to Cleverly about his leadership hopes. That doesn't mean that the former home secretary was clueless as to how his speech might be interpreted. One of the major criticisms of Badenoch is not merely the direction in which she seems to be taking the Tories, but the fact this seems to be down to 'drift' as opposed to a conscious and deliberate strategy, leaving the party undefined and chaotic. 'The first stage of surviving is defining yourself,' one centrist Tory put it. They then quoted the line from the musical Les Miserables: 'It is time for us all to decide who we are.' Cleverly's bold defence of a Conservative environmental agenda – one that takes in both economic and national security concerns – should be read, they argued, as a reminder that there is another way of doing leadership, one that isn't afraid of taking stances that come with trade-offs, 'and someone has to be a flag-bearer for it'. Finally, there is the personality issue. While Badenoch's management style veers towards abrasive and her media appearances lack cut-through, Cleverly is respected from all wings of the party as a strong media performer who can bring people together. 'James was pointing out that charismatic leaders are available,' one Tory insider quipped. 'He can't help being likeable and human.' What the speech does reveal is how far perceptions of the Tory party have travelled in a very short space of time. When Badenoch announced the party's U-turn on net zero in March, Sam Hall, director of the Conservative Environment Network, noted the decision 'undermines the significant environmental legacy of successive Conservative governments'. Six years ago Theresa May was signing the UK's net zero commitments into law; three and a half years ago Boris Johnson was championing Britain's climate leadership at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow. Back then, Cleverly's insistence that 'the idea that we must choose between a strong economy and protecting our environment is outdated and wrong' or support of climate commitments as 'defences against energy shocks and geopolitical instability' would not have been considered remotely controversial in Tory circles. Now, it's interpreted as a leadership challenge. And until the situation improves the Conservatives, so will everything else. [See also: Kemi Badenoch is in a hole – and she keeps digging] Related
The Independent
a day ago
- The Independent
What the Trump administration doesn't get about the ‘fake news' media
It was the summer of 1997 – a few months after a notable marathon libel case in which our crime correspondent, Duncan Campbell, had successfully defended his exposé of suspected corruption at Stoke Newington police station. Around four in the morning, I was jolted awake by a burly policeman in the bedroom. We were living in Highbury, North London, and I soon worked out that the house was swarming with police officers, along with their dogs. It turned out that a burglar had smashed through our front door in the middle of the night. The police eventually left and, as the last one disappeared up the path, he said to me: 'You're the editor of the Guardian, aren't you? You might like to know we're all based at Stoke Newington nick.' My heart may have missed a beat. Duncan had, after all, just vanquished five of his colleagues in court. But I was wrong: as the copper tugged his dog into the van and drove off, he said: 'Tell your Mr Campbell to keep digging.' That was the thing some people struggled to understand about the way Duncan – who died recently – worked. You could expose bent cops and be in favour of the police. You could be dealing with the Met Commissioner as chair of the Crime Reporters' Association in the morning and have a drink with a bank robber in the evening. Of course, with Duncan, it went further, as anyone who attended one of his publishing parties would know. There would be chief constables, great train robbers, judges, barristers, old lags and old hacks. The art was to work out which was which. Everyone trusted Duncan – except Mr Justice French in the Stoke Newington trial. In the previous 33 months, the police union, the Police Federation, had fought and won no fewer than 95 libel cases in a row. They were called 'garage actions' because coppers would use the guaranteed settlement money for home extensions. If Mr Justice French had had his way, the score would have been 96-0. But Duncan went into the witness box to give evidence. The jury, like everyone else, trusted Duncan. It cost him a huge amount in sleepless nights and anxiety, but the stand he took did his colleagues in the British press a considerable favour. It was now much safer to write about police corruption; it was a game-changer. Duncan died within a week of another reporter, Andrew Norfolk, whose reporting on child-grooming gangs for The Times was similarly widely lauded for its courage and integrity. At a time when trust in the media is underwater, it's heartening to be able to celebrate the best among us. Duncan wrote about the world of crime like no other reporter could even dream of. How he did it, no one could quite explain. Nick Reynolds, son of the great train robber Bruce, told me: 'You know, most villains hate journalists. I mean, the whole point of it is to try and do something and get away with it and be discreet. But somehow, through his integrity, approach, sense of humour, diligence, and demeanour, he managed to get the Golden Pass to the underworld, and they all respected him. ' Freddie Foreman, who killed people for the Krays, loved him. Mad Frankie Fraser, who extracted the teeth of his victims with pliers, adored him. But so did lawyers and police officers who cared about the truth. He was very proud of the website he created, Justice on Trial, which ran until 2017 and covered numerous miscarriages of justice. He took an interest in so many. The Miami Five, the Craigavon Two, the Shrewsbury 24, the Birmingham Six, the Cardiff Three. The Torso murders, George Davis, and Gary McKinnon. Kiranjit Ahluwalia, who had been sentenced to life for killing her abusive husband. They and many, many more had reason to thank Duncan for swimming against the tide and taking the time and trouble to investigate their cases. But most of the time, when people think about journalists, they don't think of the Campbells and Norfolks. They don't think of the risks that reporters take in covering events in the Middle East, or Ukraine, or even, as a new Amnesty International report highlights, in Northern Ireland, where there have been 71 attacks or threats against journalists since 2019. When journalists are not being attacked physically, they are under attack verbally. It is now routine White House policy to denigrate, mock, discredit and delegitimise the so-called legacy media. The objective seems plain: if Donald Trump can persuade you that the New York Times is fake news, you might not believe them the next time they investigate his affairs. The White House press secretary is 27-year-old Karoline Leavitt, who believes that Donald Trump won in 2020 and who used her very first briefing to (falsely) claim that $50m a year of US taxpayers' money was going to fund condoms in Gaza. It's unclear whether she has any journalistic experience, although she did once apply for an internship at Fox News. This week, she took it upon herself to lecture the BBC on editorial standards, tearing into a report about deaths in Gaza and claiming the BBC had been forced to retract its claims. This was fantasy stuff, as the BBC's Ros Atkins demonstrated in a devastating three-minute film the following day. But, as the old cliche goes, Truth often takes some time to get its boots on. GB News presenters, for example, chortled with glee at the 'humiliation' of the BBC seemingly without lifting a finger to interrogate whether any of Leavitt's claims were actually, you know, true. Atkins works for BBC Verify, which GB News owner, Paul Marshall, incidentally wants closed down. Truth, lies – who cares? So journalism is struggling today. Which is why it's worth pausing to remember and celebrate the best rather than dwell on the worst. We said farewell to Duncan on Tuesday. He himself was a veteran of reporting on the funerals of the villains he'd known, including gangland figures such as Charlie Richardson and Ronnie Kray, as well as the Great Train Robbers, Buster Edwards and Ronnie Biggs. Though with one, Peter Scott, a noted jewel thief who died bankrupt and penniless in 2013, it was Duncan himself who ended up organising his funeral at Islington cemetery. He arranged it at 10.15 in the morning: 'There was a discount for the early hour,' he recalled. The undertaker demanded the deceased's occupation. 'Cat burglar,' said Duncan, who also chose the music for the ceremony. The coffin disappeared to the old gospel song, Steal Away. It helps to have a sense of humour if your life is spent covering crime. Not to mention today's White House.
