Where's the Political Will?
Does Lebanon Really Want to Solve the Imam Musa Sadr Mystery?
by FRANKLIN LAMB
Cairo.
"It is not too late to re-energize the moribund Sadr-Yaacoub-Badr Eddine inquiry employing proven and widely available investigative techniques. It's a question of whether there exists the political will on the Lebanese side."
Some former
Gadaffi officials, among the hundreds lying low in Egypt
these days, continue to express remarkable interest in contributing to
uncovering
the truth surrounding the August 31, 1978 disappearance of Lebanon's Imam
Musa Sadr, Sheik Mohammed Yaacoub, and journalist Abbas Badr Eddine.
Currently in Cairo for the purpose of advancing the Sadr-Yaacoub inquiry, this observer has been granted a number of appointments with former high ranking Libyan officials who are willing to cooperate with the inquiry including, but not limited to, Ahmad Gadaffi Eldam, Abdul Rahman Chalkan, Mohamad Alkhadar, and former Libyan Foreign Minister and UN ambassador Ali Treki as well as individuals from the intelligence community and media.
It may be
recalled that it was Mohamad Alkhadar during his recent stay at the Grand Hyatt
Hotel in Cairo, that the close Muammar Gadaffi associate revealed that it was
Libyan intelligence operative Mohammad Rehiby, with another officer (identity
soon to be revealed), who was sent on 8/3/78 by Gadaffi's chief of intelligence
for 40 years and brother in law, Abdullah Senussi to check into the Holiday Inn
in Rome carrying Musa Sadr and Mohammad Yaacoub's passports and luggage.
Rehiby, was wearing the Imams clothes and he shuffled a bit as he walked on
elevated shoes wanting to appear taller. The Imam was 6 feet 6 inches tall.
Instead Rehiby drew curious stares from the hotel front desk staff and guests,
compromising his mission a bit. Two days later Mr. Rehiby returned to Tripoli
in his own secular clothes, without the shoes which he left in "Imam Sadr's
room". For years Rehiby shoes jokes passed among Gadaffi regime insiders and
Abdullah Senussi was kidded by his brother in law, according to friends.
Ali Abdussalam Treki, Libya's former foreign minister, who is currently living
in an
apartment in Cairo, sometimes gives interviews at the Sofitel Hotel in Cairo
surrounded by body guards. During part of the 1970's and 1980's, Treki also
served as Libya's Permanent Representative to the UN and was elected President
of the UN General Assembly 2009-2010. He has been able to confirm key details
of the Sadr-Yaacoub 1978 visit to Libya. His cooperation continues as he, like
some of the other ex-officials in the Gadaffi regime, attempts to negotiate
return to his cherished homeland. This observer first met Ambassador Treki,
back in 1986 following the Reagan attack on the Gaddafi compound in Tripoli.
The heightened interest in finally solving the Sadr-Yaacoub case is
evidenced by questions being raised here concerning why the widely
perceived void of credible progress in unraveling the trio's fate, a
mystery for the past 34 years.
The fall of the
Gadaffi regime initially led to much speculation that the Sadr-Yaacoub case
would finally be solved. Yet despite some brief meetings in Libya, including
one with Abdullah Senussi in Mauritania, nothing much new has been learned
according to Lebanese officials selected to investigate and resolve this
mystery.
Mauritanian and Libyan officials have expressed the opinion, that some
of those close to Gadaffi's regime have
believed since September 3, 1978. And which is that Musa Sadr was killed three
days earlier on Gadaffi's direct orders, with foreign backing, and buried in
the desert south of Tripoli. This
observer visited the suspected site where during late July 2011 with three then
Libyan officials, one of whom is currently in Egypt. Negotiations continue with
respect to the Libyan government's cooperation regarding partial exhumation of
located remains to be followed immediately by scientifically conducted and
supervised DNA testing.
Lebanese Minister of Foreign Affairs, Adnan Mansour, was quoted in Afkar
magazine recently as saying that the key Senussi meeting was not successful and
that "Abdullah Senussi played with us leaving us more confused."
Mansour's
statement supports what ex-Libyan officials who know Senussi
well, and who were interviewed in early November 2012 in Cairo, expressed which
is that Senussi did not take the Lebanese side seriously after just minutes
into the meeting.
Former officials also note the necessity of adding professional investigators to the Lebanese team. Gadaffi regime ex-officials have explained to this observer that Senessi, well known as a tough, smart, experienced analyst and judge of people's credibility quickly came to suspect that the Lebanese side was ambivalent about pursuing a serious investigation of the Sadr-Yaacoub case and appeared content to prolong the 34 year mystery.
Among those who
care about the Sadr-Yaacoub-Badr Eddine case both in
Lebanon and internationally, including millions of Shia Muslims and others, as well
as the international investigative team that has been working on the case for
the past 17 months, questions abound.
Some of the puzzlement rises from the unsubstantiated claims by some in Lebanon that DNA tests were made by "DNA specialists" but proved negative. These claims have not been supported by any probative evidence relating to the timing and place the tissue samples were gathered or even the identity or competence of the "DNA specialists." Nor has there been any scientific testimony regarding the alleged tests, relating to where the samples were gathered or the vital chain of secured custody or even laboratory reports of any and all DNA samples or testing.
Some friends
and longtime associates of Abdullah Senussi, as well as some lawyers currently
working in the Libyan Ministry of Justice in Tripoli, who claim to know the
Sadr-Yaacoub case from the Libyan side, question whether there
has even been any competent DNA testing conducted. In any event, no samples
have been taken nor has the soil been disturbed from the location where it is
believed the Imams remains are located.
Certain current
and former Libyan officials are willing to help with an
honest objective investigation, but need assurance that the Lebanese side is
serious. One Judge at the Libyan Ministry of Justice has made the serious
charge that the "Sadr-Yaacoub investigation" was designed in Lebanon to mislead
the Lebanese public.
Among the many questions being raised are the following: why Lebanon has
failed to add an experienced investigator or to enlarge the team with
family members? Would not a larger team or at least one with more
experienced professionals obtain more results in less time? Logically, do
not the families have the strongest interest in learning the truth and
should they not be represented or directly involved? Why have they
consistently been refused participation? Why did not the Lebanese side
disclose that Libya paid Mauritania one billion dollars to breach its earlier
signed agreement and refusal not to extradite Senussi? Why did the team wait
from March 1 when Senussi was arrested entering Mauritania with a fake passport
until September 2012 to visit Senussi who all agree knows the case very well?
The Lebanese
investigating committee has more than once stated that "All media speculations
on Sadr's case has been proven to be false." Yet, most of the media speculation
was based on sources close to the same committee. This fact raises questions
about what were these speculations and how were they proven false and with what
evidence?
Some observers believe that the public and the followers of Musa Sadr and
Mohammad Yaaoub, including from among the Muslim and Christian
communities, deserve a full and probative inquiry. It is not too late to
achieve this goal since several knowledgeable witnesses, including two
eyewitnesses, are still available.
Ex-Libyan officials report that they have little interest in prolonging
the mystery of this case and reminded this observer that Muammar Gadaffi's
son, Saif al-Islam, currently awaiting trial, most probably to be held in Libya
they claim, rather than in the Hague as favored by the UN and international
judicial opinion, stated last summer that "It's time to finish with the
Sadr file." Before he was on the run following the surprise takeover of Tripoli
by NATO backed rebels early last August, he intended to do this.
International investigators have also found that current Libyan
officials from various factions are quite willing to cooperate in uncovering
the
truth while former regime members are trying to deal with other more
pressing personal problems and almost to a person have expressed no
interest in blocking the truth that can be established beyond peradventure
by reliable DNA testing. The charge that ex-Gadaffi officials are "still
meddling in the Sadr case" appears spurious and anchored in Lebanon, not Libya.
Moreover, there is to date no evidence to suggest that local Libyan courts or
International Courts, including the International Criminal Court, will be
involved in the Sadr delegation case that would bar the Libyan government's
cooperation. Nor has there been credible evidence of foot dragging from the
Libyan side as some have claimed.
One tentative conclusion surfaces concerning the Sadr-Yaacoub-Badr Eddine
case and it is that the "investigation" over the past year is deeply flawed and
has created many more questions about its work than answers about this three
decades old mystery.
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