by Hademine Ould Sadi – NOUAKCHOTT (AFP)
Mauritania’s president has promised Libya a “positive” outcome in its quest to have Moamer Kadhafi’s ex-spy chief extradited to stand trial on home soil, a Libyan leader said Tuesday.
Libya’s vice-premier Mustafa Abu Shagur met Mauritanian leader Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz in Nouakchott Tuesday to discuss the extradition of Kadhafi’s feared former right-hand man Abdullah Senussi, also wanted by France and the International Criminal Court.
In addition, Saudia Arabia and Spain want to interrogate Senussi over attacks committed in their countries, a diplomatic source in Nouakchott told AFP.
Senussi was detained at Nouakchott airport Friday after arriving on a flight from Casablanca in Morocco, using a false passport.
“He (Senussi) is Libyan and the Libyan people want to see him and assure he obtains a fair trial in Libya. We thus highly appreciate the position of the president who has promised something positive in this regard,” Abu Shagar told journalists.
“We have thanked the president for the courageous decision he took in deciding to arrest Abdullah Senussi. It is a historic and brave decision the Libyan people will never forget, because this man was the second most important person in Libya after Kadhafi.”
Senussi was the subject of an ICC arrest warrant issued on June 27, which says he was an “indirect perpetrator of crimes against humanity, of murder and persecution based on political grounds” in the eastern city of Benghazi.
Senussi is also the subject of an international arrest warrant after a Paris court sentenced him in absentia to life imprisonment for involvement in the downing of a French UTA airliner over Niger in September 1989.
The plane was carrying 170 people from Brazzaville to Paris via N’Djamena.
That attack — along with the bombing of a Pan Am jumbo jet over Lockerbie, Scotland in December 1988 in which 270 people were killed — led to a UN-mandated air blockade of Libya in 1992.
The diplomatic source said president Aziz had met with ambassadors from Saudi Arabia and Spain on Monday who wanted to discuss the possibility of questioning Senussi over acts committed by the Kadhafi regime.
These include the attempted assassination in 2003 of then Saudi crown prince Abdullah, who is know king, and unspecified attacks in Madrid.
“The two countries are looking for answers from Mauritania in relation to its investigation into (Senussi) who is seen as the ‘black box’ of the Libyan regime,” the source said.
The Mauritanian president also met with French ambassador Herve Besancenot.
Nine political parties and civil society organisations seen as allies of the slain Kadhafi on Tuesday called on Mauritania not to extradite Senussi, but let him “choose his own fate”.
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