Grim death footage resurfaces after decades

Rebel forces fire artillery at Libyan government troops outside the town of Ajdabiyah, in the north-east of the country, on Monday. Photo: Reuters

MUAMMAR Gaddafi had already ruled Libya for 15 years in June 1984 and had a fearsome reputation for brutality towards his enemies. But the scene that unfolded in the eastern city of Benghazi was a spectacular first even for him.
Thousands of schoolchildren and students were bussed into Benghazi's basketball stadium, where they saw a young man with curly hair and beard, kneeling with his hands bound behind his back, pleading for his life before people's prosecutors.
Sadiq Hamid Shwehdi, 30, was accused of plotting to assassinate the leader of the revolution. The court described him as ''a terrorist from the Muslim Brotherhood, an agent of America''. In recently rediscovered film, Shwehdi is seen alone in the centre of the stadium, sobbing as he confesses before being sentenced to death.

Advertisement: Story continues below

In the crowd, a young woman in olive green fatigues shouts and waves her fists. Later, she pulls at Shwehdi's legs as he writhes on the gallows until he stops struggling.
''Many Libyans saw the original live broadcast of the trial at the time and still remember it, but this is the full video and audio - and it has not been seen since then,'' said Peter Bouckaert, the Human Rights Watch researcher who unearthed the material.
Until now only fragments were available. Shwehdi's brother Ibrahim handed over four videotapes to be digitised and preserved for posterity.
Bouckaert worked with Tim Hetherington, a US war photographer who was killed in April in Misrata. Together they pored over hundreds of photographs taken from a state security office that was looted by protesters.
Shwehdi's execution followed an assault on Colonel Gaddafi's Bab al-Aziziya compound in Tripoli the previous month, an attempted coup planned by the National Front for the Salvation of Libya, which the regime claimed was CIA-backed. Two thousand people were arrested and 12 hanged.
''Shwehdi's execution was ordered by a state-managed kangaroo court,'' said Ashour Shamis, a London-based dissident who helped plan the coup. Shwehdi and the others were trained in Morocco and Sudan. Some entered Libya from neighbouring Tunisia, where the operation was overseen by security chief Zein al-Abidine Ben Ali, who later became the country's president.
Colonel Gaddafi, his son, Saif al-Islam, and intelligence chief Abdullah Senussi are wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of crimes against humanity committed in February.
''This film will not be relevant to the ICC case because that only covers a limited time period,'' said Bouckaert. ''But we felt that it was important to preserve this traumatic part of the heritage of the Libyan people.''
GUARDIAN


Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/world/grim-death-footage-resurfaces-after-decades-20110719-1hn3n.html#ixzz1Scnc0v9d