Libya: Mass Grave Yields 34 BodiesGaddafi Loyalists Had Detained Men at Base
September 14, 2011
(Tripoli) – Thirty-four bodies exhumed from a mass grave near the town of al-Qawalish in western Libya seem to be those of men detained by pro-Gaddafi forces in early June 2011, Human Rights Watch said today.
The evidence strongly suggests the detainees were executed at that time, before the pro-Gaddafi forces fled from the area, in the Nafusa mountains. The bodies of another three who seem to have been executed by the same perpetrators have also been discovered nearby. Witnesses told Human Rights Watch the victims hadbeen detained from or near their homes or at a major checkpoint in the area, and included at least nine men aged over 60, including an 89-year-old man. The majority were from the nearby town of al-Qal’a.
“The mass grave at al-Qawalish contains further evidence strongly suggesting that Gaddafi loyalists carried out mass executions of detainees as they struggled to suppress the uprising,” said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch. “These victims included some very old men, some executed together with their sons.”
During a visit by Human Rights Watch to the region shortly after pro-Gaddafi forces had fled the area on July 6,the new authorities in towns near al-Qawalish furnished the names of 173 missing men, including 81 from al-Qal’a. Villagers and investigators from the ad hoc regional council for the Nafusa mountains said the fate of the missing was not established until rebels captured a Gaddafi loyalist whose mobile phone contained a video clip showing the bodies of men, bound and blindfolded, lying in a forest clearing. Relatives of many of the missing from al-Qal’a told Human Rights Watch they recognized some of the dead in the video, and recognized the location as a forest behind a Libyan Scouts base on the western edge of al-Qawalish.
The Libyan Red Crescent Society conducted the exhumation beginning on August 20, with the consent of the National Transitional Council (NTC), the de facto authority that controls most of Libya. An investigative team from the Nafusa mountains regional council was also present. Twenty-seven of the 34 bodies were subsequently identified.
The exhumed bodies were blindfolded with hands tied. The discovery of bullet casings at the site suggests the captors shot the men with automatic gunfire before burying them in a shallow common grave. Near the mass grave is a separate grave containing three more bodies that have not yet been exhumed, but have been tentatively identified based on footwear and other physical evidence.
Human Rights Watch has interviewed three men from al-Qal’a who were detained at the Scouts base, as well as five family members of others who were detained and later apparently executed, and who had witnessed their arrests. The accounts collected by Human Rights Watch describe widespread house raids and arrests by the pro-Gaddafi forces, often in apparent retaliation for losses suffered by the Gaddafi forces at the hands of those supporting the NTC, as well as brutal beatings and torture by the Gaddafi forces of those detained at the base.
Mohammed Ramadan al-Barghout, 34, a physics teacher, told Human Rights Watch on September 10 that he had been detained by Gaddafi loyalists at his house in Umm el-Jershan in early June and taken to the Scouts base. He said he had seen about half of those later found in the mass grave alive in detention when he arrived, and that he had witnessed the brutal beatings of two brothers, Emhammed Al-Shatour, 17, and El-Hasmi Al-Shatour:
Emhammed Al-Shatour was beaten until his leg was broken. They were beating him in front of his father to try and make the father confess, right after I arrived at the Scouts base. They just grabbed Emhammed and tied him up and started beating him with a stick on his leg, a heavy wooden stick. His brother El-Hasmi was being beaten at the same time in the next room. They brought the boys’ father to witness the beating so he would talk and give them information. Two or three soldiers were doing the beatings until they got tired, and then others came to take over. Their father was crying, saying he didn’t know anything about the rebels. The Gaddafi soldiers were calling them rats, saying “you rats brought NATO, you dogs.”
Both sons and the father were among the victims who were exhumed.
...
“The evidence of mass executions by Gaddafi forces keeps on mounting and Libyans deserve to know that the killers will be brought to justice,” Bouckaert said. “The new government should guarantee that evidence of such terrible crimes will prompt a full accounting and real justice for the victims.”
Bodies recovered from the exhumed mass grave:
Ahmed Mohammed al-Khamoushi, 33
Omar Gergab Ahmed Gergab, 69
Emhammed Mohammed Al-Shatour, 17
El-Hashmi Mohammed Al-Shatour, 38
Mohammed Emhammed Al-Shatour, 61 (father of Emhammed and El-Hasmi As-Shatour)
Ali Emhammed Al-Baden, 34
Mohammed Suleiman Al-Baden, 71 (father of Ali Al-Baden)
Talal el-Hadi Omar Areibi, 18
Suleiman Abdel Salaam Abu al-QassimAjal, 23
Mahmoud Mohammed el-Harari, 39
Mohammed Emhammed el-Harari, 28
Salim Suleiman Ali Suleiman, 30
Emhammed Abu al-QassimEmhammedAjal, 69
Abdel Salaam Abu al-QassimEmhammedAjal, 72 (brother of EmhammedAjal)
Rabiye Said Omar Al-Azabi, 21
Saleh Abdullah Ali Omar, 75
Abdel Hamid Gerada el-TaherAreibi, 27
Fuad Abdullah EmhammedGheida, 29
Mohammed Emhammed Ahmed Gheida, 46
Emhammed Ahmed Abdullah Gheida, 83 (father of Mohammed Gheida)
Areibi Ali Othman Ashur, 55
Saed Ali Othman Ashur, 58 (brother of AreibiAshur)
Ashraf Abu al-Qassim Saleh Ahmed al-Azabi, 19
Abu al-Qassim Saleh Ahmed al-Azabi, 47 (father of Ashraf al-Azabi)
SalimYunisSalimKreir, 89
HamedJadu al-Khalif (Syrian national), 51
Abdullah Emhammed Suleiman El-Darduri, 53
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Unidentified male
Bodies identified at separate grave site but not yet exhumed:
Ramadan Mohammed al-Barghout, 77
Saleh Mohammed al-Khamoushi, 50
Miloud Mohammed al-Khamoushi, 53
more...
http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/09/14/libya-mass-grave-yields-34-bodies 
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