After nearly ten years of detention in Lebanon, Hannibal Gaddafi, son of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, obtained a decision for conditional release. The Lebanese courts ordered his release on bail, subject to several restrictions.
According to Lebanese judicial sources, the release is subject to the payment of bail estimated at $11 million. However, this decision does not mean an immediate return to total freedom: Hannibal Gaddafi remains subject to a ban on leaving Lebanese territory for two months, while additional procedures are finalized.
Arrested in December 2015 in Lebanon, Hannibal Gaddafi was detained as part of the investigation into the disappearance in 1978 of Shiite imam Moussa Sadr, a highly sensitive affair for the Lebanese Shiite community. Although he was never directly charged in this case, he was kept in preventive detention for years, without a formal trial, sparking widespread criticism from NGOs and lawyers denouncing arbitrary detention.
Nine years of controversial detentione
The Lebanese decision comes in a context of diplomatic pressure from the Libyan authorities, who have long called for his repatriation. His family, notably his mother Safia Farkash, based in Oman, claims that Hannibal has no connection with the Moussa Sadr affair, being only three years old at the time of the events.
This conditional release could also open a new phase of negotiations between Beirut and Tripoli, while the question of the missing Libyans and Lebanese remains an open wound.
