Libya arrests army officers with possible knowledge of Sadr fate

Lebanon was recently informed that Libyan authorities have arrested 10 Libyans, including army officers, as part of their investigation into the disappearance of Imam Musa Sadr, a Lebanese judicial source told The Daily Star. “The arrested officers are not necessarily among those who took part in the kidnapping, but were bodyguards of prominent former Libyan regime figures who are believed to know the fate of Imam Sadr,” said the source. The source said that Lebanon was starting to see “seriousness” on the part of Libyan authorities in dealing with Sadr’s case. Sadr, Sheikh Mohammad Yaacoub and journalist Abbas Badreddine went missing in Libya on Aug. 31, 1978, on an official visit at the invitation of late Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Earlier this week, a Lebanese delegation comprising Foreign Minister Adnan Mansour, Lebanese Judge Hasan Shami and Haitham Joumaa, the director-general of the Foreign Affairs Ministry’s Expatriates Department, met in Mauritania with Libya’s detained former intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senoussi, but failed to obtain concrete information on Sadr’s fate. Other sources told The Daily Star that the Lebanese delegation was insisting on meeting with Seif al-Islam, Gadhafi’s son. Seif al-Islam is being held by the Libyan authorities who have yet to reply to a request by the Lebanese delegation to meet him. “Seif al-Islam and Senoussi are currently the most important members in the case,” said one of the sources.