By Ashraf Abdul-Wahab.
Tripoli, 14 July 2014:
It is reported that Abdulmonem Al-Said, the man who played a prime role in the kidnapping of former prime minister Ali Zeidan last October, has been killed along with two of his bodyguards on the airport road near the Ministry of Interior.
The killing has not been confirmed but a photo of a dead man closely resembling Al-Said has appeared on social media. The Libyan Revolutionaries Operations Room (LROR), which was also involved in Zeidan’s kidnapping, has accused the Zintani Sawaq Brigade of the killings.
LROR is part of the alliance of Islamist-leaning revolutionaries that launched the weekend attack on Sawaq and Qaaqaa Brigades that has resulted in the closure of Tripoli International Airport.
At the time of Zeidan’s abduction, Al-Said headed the Counter Crime Agency’s (CCA) bureau in Tripoli’s Fornaj district. He was questioned about his role in the affair but never charged despite continuing to boast of his part in it.
Zintan Local Council was one of the bodies that demanded that he and all those involved be arrested and punished.
Since then, Al-Said was reported to have moved to head the CCA’s marine surveillance operations.
Last month, he was briefly kidnapped. He claimed afterwards that he had been tortured and that those behind his abduction were “a force belonging to the Ministry of Interior”. The reason for their doing so, he alleged, was because he had submitted documents to the Attorney General incriminating “Zeidan’s gang and his special militias” in what he claimed was the theft of LD 29 billion of state funds. He also implicated Prime Minister Abdullah Al-Thinni.
It is not clear at present to what extent he was involved in Operation Dawn against the Sawaq and Qaaqaa brigades, but it seems highly unlikely that he would not have been playing a significant role.
Both Sawaq and Qaaqaa are usually called Zintani brigades, however most of their members are Tripoli-based, but with family origins in Zintan – and therefore ties and loyalties to it. [/restrict] [/restrict]
