BELGIUM: Libyans in Brussels push for crimes against humanity charge against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi

Record ID: 575143

  • Title: BELGIUM: Libyans in Brussels push for crimes against humanity charge against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi
  • Date: 25th February 2011
  • Summary: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (FEBRUARY 24, 2011) (REUTERS) EXTERIOR OF COURTHOUSE BELGIAN-LIBYANS STANDING IN MAIN ENTRANCE OF COURT
  • Embargoed: 12th March 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Belgium, Belgium
  • Country: Belgium
  • Topics: International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVA3TRKQEKRVJE8MKQ5RQLNPDPV1
  • Story Text: A group of Libyan citizens in Brussels plan to file a complaint with Belgium's highest court accusing Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi of crimes against humanity.
    Libyans in Belgium gathered at Brussels' Palace of Justice on Thursday (February 24) to demand that charges of crimes against humanity be brought against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
    Led by Belgian human rights attorney Georges-Henri Beauthier and representatives from Amnesty International, the group urged the international community to take action in Libya.
    "The European Parliament and the Belgian Parliament should do something. We have told everyone here what is happening in Libya," said one protester whilst holding the picture of a dead Libyan.
    Abul Kasem Forgane, a Libyan living in Belgium, held a picture of one of his dead countrymen as he demanded that the people around the world stand against the Gaddafi.
    "Time to take action to save the innocent people who's paying the consequences for that dictatorship. Co-operating with him in whatsoever, it doesn't help us. If you want to help us, you have to stand up," Forgane said.
    Belgium is one of only a handful of countries where citizens can bring legal action against international figures after the introduction of the "principle of the universal jurisdiction" in 1993, which allows complaints about war crimes from other countries to be brought before Belgian courts.
    Beauthier says he hopes a complaint filed against Gaddafi in Belgium's highest court will spur leaders world-wide to take sanctions against Gaddafi.
    "There are about 50 to 60 Belgians and Libyans who have decided to take action and to ask the Belgian and European authorities --- because we are in Brussels --- to make an appeal to the U.N. Security Council, so that the Security Council would ask the International Criminal Court and (ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno) Ocampo to make an inquiry so that Gaddafi and his clan can be judged," Beauthier said.
    "And he should know already by now that he is going to be pursued," he added.
    World leaders condemned Muammar Gaddafi's bloody crackdown on a revolt that has split Libya, but took little action to halt the bloodshed from the latest upheaval reshaping the Arab world.
    As many as 1,000 people may have been killed in Libya, said Italy's foreign minister. Unconfirmed reports spoke of troops and African mercenaries firing on protesters in the desert nation pumping nearly 2 percent of the world's oil output.
    A medical official said some 320 had died in Benghazi alone since protests against oppression and poverty began last week.
    Gaddafi has said he will not step down and put an end to his 41-year rule, even as protesters control the eastern half of the North African country.
    Many nations have already declared sanctions against Libya, most notably France and the United States.
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