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Inmates accused by Libyan rebels of supporting the former regime sit on mattresses at an army-run prison in the western city of Misrata on January 29, 2012. (Mahmud Turkia/AFP/Getty Images)
Moammar Gadhafi-era abuses did not end when the regime fell and the dictator died. With local militias controlling sections of the country without government oversight, Amnesty International says in a new report, that they are also guilty of inhumane treatment of prisoners in Libya.
The London-based human rights group said the militias, many of which fought in last year’s civil war against Gadhafi, “commit widespread human rights abuses with impunity, fuelling insecurity, and hindering the rebuilding of state institutions.”
African migrants and refugees that were displaced in the war have not been spared from what Amnesty described as rampant and serious abuses, which include war crimes and crimes against humanity. The new rulers of Libya, the National Transitional Council (NTC), seem unable or unwilling to curb the abuses, it says.
“A year ago Libyans risked their lives to demand justice. Today their hopes are being jeopardized by lawless armed militias who trample human rights with impunity,” stated Donatella Rovera, a senior crisis advisor with Amnesty.
She said the militias are continuing abuses that were committed under Gadhafi, the longtime Libyan strongman who was deposed last October.
Amnesty said there have been numerous examples and a great deal of evidence that torture is being employed by the militias. At least 12 detainees held by the militias have been killed after being tortured, with their bodies covered in wounds, cuts, bruises, and some had their fingernails and toenails pulled out.
There was also evidence that the detainees were tortured to confess to crimes that they may or may not have committed, the rights group said. Some inmates said they were beaten for several hours with whips, cables, plastic hoses, bars, and chains, or given electric shocks. An Amnesty representative said they witnessed beatings of inmates at the hands of armed militias in a prison center in Misrata.
Humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders said last month that it would stop working in detention centers in Misrata because medical staff were being asked to treat detainees who were tortured by their captors, only to be sent back for more abuse.
In another prison in Tripoli, Amnesty investigators found several severely tortured detainees who the militia members attempted to conceal, according to the report.
Earlier this month, Human Rights Watch said the former Libyan ambassador to France, Omar Brebesh, was pronounced dead within 24 hours of being apprehended by a Tripoli-based militia group and appeared to have suffered torture.
In an estimate on Thursday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said approximately 8,500 people are being held in around 60 Libyan detention centers across the country. Around 10 percent of those detainees are foreign nationals.
The Red Cross seemed to corroborate Amnesty’s claims that many of the prisons were operated by militias that acted independently of the NTC government.