Amidst all the violence and killing under Gaddafi’s government in Libya, the family lived a life of luxury and opulence atypical of a fundamentalist muslim family, but not uncommon of the rich and powerful in the Arab world.
The discovery of an iPad belonging to the youngest son of former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi has revealed hundreds of shocking images of torture alongside glamorous shots of the family’s mansions, yachts and private jet.
It is believed to be the personal computer of high-rolling Hannibal Gaddafi, whose history is littered with allegations of domestic abuse, violence, torture and kidnappings.
The tablet surfaced after it was seized from his home in Tripoli by militiamen fighting against his father in 2011, before being passed through activists groups and journalists in a covert operation to smuggle it out of the country.
The images have finally been made public after Hannibal was mysteriously kidnapped near Lebanon’s Syrian border, on December 11.
The 40-year-old was then taken into custody on December 13 by Lebanese authorities for allegedly withholding information about the 1978 disappearance of a revered Shiite cleric, in Libya.
Hundreds of images show the Gaddafi family living the high-life on luxury holidays and hopping between their many mansions.
But the discovery of more than 1,700 images of beaten and tortured prisoners reveal a much darker side to Gaddafi’s glamorous lifestyle.
The battered people in the photographs, with blood-shot eyes and bloodied mouths, are believed to be detainees at the infamous Bosleem prison in Tripoli.
Dozens more videos were also saved on the tablet, which appear to show prisoners being tortured during questioning.
But this is not the first time that allegations of violence have brought the life of Hannibal Gaddafi and his wife, former lingerie model Aline Skaf, under the microscope.
The parents-of-two were both arrested by Swiss authorities in 2008, on charges of ‘bodily harm, threatening behaviour and coercion’ after claims they abused two of their staff at the Gaddafi’s hotel in Geneva.
Gaddafi also faced claims in 2008, from a Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet, that he had directed the abduction and beating of a Libyan national while studying as a student in Copenhagen.
Although Gaddafi brought a lawsuit against the newspaper, he failed to appear in court to present his side of the case and the court ruled in support of the newspaper’s version of events.
Perhaps most shockingly, police were called to Claridge’s Hotel in London in 2009, after reports of a woman screaming from inside.
Police were met by three of Gaddafi’s bodyguards blocking the entrance to the couple’s room in the luxury hotel.
His wife Aline was then discovered inside the room bleeding heavily, and she had to be taken by ambulance to hospital where she was treated for facial injuries.
During the Libyan civil war in 2011 Gaddafi and his wife fled to Algeria, before moving to Oman in October 2012 after they were granted political asylum.
The tablet was first seized when a group of militiamen, who were fighting against the dictator Muammar Gaddafi, entered Hannibal’s Tripoli home in August 2011.
Flying high: Hannibal Gaddafi and his wife, Aline Skaf, have faced numerous allegations of violence and domestic disputes, including a 2009 incident at London hotel Claridge’s after she was found beaten and bloody in their suite.
- Daily Mail
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