IN a trial that was widely seen as a travesty of justice, a court in rebel-held Tripoli has sentenced eight former leading members of the Gaddafi regime to death by firing squad for a range of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Among the condemned men are the dictator's feared security chief, Abdullah Senussi and former prime minister Baghdadi Al-Mahmoudi. But the most prominent death sentence is that for Gaddafi's son and heir apparent, Saif Al-Islam. He was sentenced in his absence because he is held by tribesmen in Zintan, who captured him in the final days of the revolution and have ever since refused to surrender him to anyone. Saif actually made three appearances in the courtroom last year by video link. However, this mechanism broke down in July when Libya Dawn rebels seized the capital, in the process deliberately torching the international airport, destroying billions of dollars-worth of airliners and driving out Zintani militias who had controlled the airport since they captured it during the revolution. The trial has been opaque. The evidence against the 37 accused was never published. There has been regular adjournments. Observers have been harassed. One UN monitor was arrested and held briefly on a charge of witchcraft. Journalists have been given intermittent access. The one time proceedings were broadcast live, former premier Mahmoudi said that he had been tortured. The TV cameras were not permitted back. It appears that the attorneys for all 38 accused (one of whom died of cancer two weeks ago) had just a single day to all present the defenses for each of their clients. The internationally-recognized Libyan government of Abdullah Al-Thinni has condemned the trial as a farce and urged the international community not to recognize the legitimacy of the outcome. The UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) has also been unequivocal in its criticism of the mass trial. Yet one UN agency, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been so extraordinary in its behavior over the case, that there must be serious doubts as to whether it is fit for purpose. Even as the fighting was still going on in 2011, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Gaddafi as well as Saif and Senussi. This meant that if and when they were captured, the men would be extradited to The Hague for a full trial. The ICC's chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda has continued to demand that Saif be handed over on the grounds that he could not receive a fair trial in Libya. Yet mysteriously Bensouda said that Senussi should be tried in Libya because it would be fair. She blocked attempts by Senussi to be tried in The Hague. So here we have Bensouda, a former minister of justice in the Gambia, insisting that the very same trial is unfair for Saif Gaddafi but entirely fair for Abdullah Senussi. Moreover, in a public hearing at the UN she reported that she had evidence that the proceedings against Senussi were being properly conducted. She has never produced that evidence. Nor has she ever explained the absurd contradiction that a single trial can be both legitimate and illegitimate for different defendants. The fate of these former Gaddafi regime henchmen is secondary to the fate of the ICC or at the least, of its chief prosecutor Ms. Bensouda. It is surely time for her to consider her position, or if she is unwilling to do so, for the ICC to consider it for her.
