About 4,000 accused
supporters of former dictator Moammar Qaddafi are still being held in Libyan
militia detention centers, often in secret and many are tortured, a UN envoy
said Thursday.
Ian Martin, head of the UN
mission to Libya, said good progress was being made toward the country's first
democratic election, but militia prisons were one of a number of "serious
obstacles" to establishing the rule of law.
"Cases of mistreatment
and torture of detainees continue," Martin told the UN Security Council.
The UN has raised "deep concern" over the deaths in April of three
people at a prison in Misrata which comes under government authority.
There was "credible
information" that the deaths were caused by torture and that at least
seven other people had been tortured at the same prison, said the head of the
UN Support Mission in Libya, or UNSMIL.
There have also been
allegations of torture at prisons in Tripoli, Zawiya and Zintan.
The UN said in October that
7,000 prisoners, mainly supporters of Moammar Qaddafi, were held by the
revolutionary brigades which led the fight to overthrown the late dictator last
year.
About 4,000 are estimated
to remain in formal and secret prisons around the country where the transitional
government is only slowly getting a grip on power, Martin said.
The justice ministry now
has 31 detention facilities with about 3,000 inmates, he said. But control of
many of these is shared with the revolutionary militias that have retained
significant powers.
"Addressing these
practices should be a top government priority in pursuit of a new culture of
human rights and the rule of law," said Martin. Qaddafi's government was
notorious for rights abuses.
The interim government has
passed a law which orders militias to refer all cases against Qaddafi
supporters to prosecutors by July 1.
But the envoy also raised
concerns about some aspects of new laws that grant amnesty to fighters involved
in overthrowing Qaddafi and which criminalize "the glorification" of
the dictator who was killed in October.
Human Rights Watch and
other groups have said the amnesty law could allow people who have committed
"serious crimes" to go free based on politics. "It propagates a
culture of selective justice that Libyans fought so hard to overcome,"
said HRW's Middle East and North Africa specialist Joe Stork.
Martin said that as of
Wednesday night, just over one million people had registered for the country's
first ever democratic election.
The ruling National
Transitional Council has pledged to hold the election for a 200-seat
constituent assembly in June, but diplomats said there are worries that it may
have to be delayed.
Martin said there was a
potential voting list of between three and 3.5 million people.
Registration opened on May
1 and the UN envoy said women made up only 36 percent of those who had put
their names down so far.
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