Why a probe into the killing of notorious human trafficker ‘Bija’ is a test of Libya’s rule of law

Analysis Why a probe into the killing of notorious human trafficker ‘Bija’ is a test of Libya’s rule of law
Abdel-Rahman Milad also known as ‘Bija’. (Supplied)
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Updated 16 September 2024
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Why a probe into the killing of notorious human trafficker ‘Bija’ is a test of Libya’s rule of law

Why a probe into the killing of notorious human trafficker ‘Bija’ is a test of Libya’s rule of law
  • Abdel-Rahman Milad was killed in Tripoli on Sept. 1, raising fresh concerns about Libya’s political instability — and European border control
  • The former coast guard commander’s murder has cast a light on the country’s militia power struggles, organized crime, and political rivalries

LONDON: Abdel-Rahman Milad, known as “Bija,” a former coast guard commander notorious for human trafficking, was killed in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, on Sept. 1, shining a harsh light on the North African country’s chaotic political landscape.

Milad’s death has drawn renewed attention to the intersections between the country’s rival militias, organized crime networks, and weak government institutions, and has raised questions about the wider implications for European border security.

“Milad’s assassination sends shockwaves far beyond Libya’s borders,” Anas El-Gomati, director of the Sadeq Institute, Libya’s first independent public policy think tank and research center based in Tripoli, told Arab News.

“For Europe, it’s a stark reminder that their outsourced border control is built on quicksand.”

Milad’s violent end marks the culmination of a long, controversial career that has become emblematic of the lawlessness and corruption that has plagued Libya since the fall of Muammar Qaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011.

For more than a decade, the oil-rich nation has been divided between two rival administrations, each with its own international backers and militia allies. Its dysfunctional governance has left it seemingly unable to reform its economy or provide for its population.

This was amply demonstrated in September last year, when devastating floods hit the coastal town of Derna after Storm Daniel caused two dams to collapse, unleashing torrents of water that swept away entire neighborhoods.

The disaster left thousands dead or missing, many of them migrants who had arrived in the town with plans to make the sea crossing to Europe. Political instability hindered rescue efforts, and recovery has been slow due to the fractured state of the country.

“Libya’s chaos didn’t just emerge — it was engineered,” said El-Gomati. “Bija’s death highlights a painful truth about Libya’s ongoing turmoil. It’s not just a story of internal strife but one of international negligence and miscalculation.”

Indeed, multiple foreign powers have interfered in Libyan affairs since Qadaffi’s ouster, creating the conditions for armed groups and criminal gangs to flourish.

“The residual division and stalemate is untenable and has allowed international and local actors to shape the chaos to their advantage,” said El-Gomati. “This persistent instability is a direct result of enabling those who thrive on the country’s dysfunction.”

Milad was a prominent figure in the Libyan Coast Guard, commanding a unit in Zawiya, a coastal town in the west of the country that had become a hotspot for people smuggling. While officially responsible for intercepting migrant boats, Milad was deeply involved in human trafficking.

He was sanctioned by the UN Security Council in 2018 for his role in sinking migrant boats and for working with smuggling networks to exploit migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.

Libya’s geographic position as a gateway to Europe has made it a prime route for migrants from Africa and the Middle East seeking better lives, but it has also turned the country into a battleground for smuggling networks and militias seeking to profit from the chaos.

The EU’s strategy of relying on Libyan forces to control migration flows has been called into question, with many warning that it has done little to address the root causes of migration or the human rights abuses that migrants face in Libya.

“The real question is whether this crisis will force Europe to rethink its approach to migration management in Libya, or if it will continue to rely on an unstable and corrupt system that only perpetuates chaos,” said El-Gomati.

Milad’s notoriety stemmed not only from his criminal activities but also from his involvement in international diplomacy. In 2017, he participated in a meeting in Sicily, where Libyan Coast Guard officials and humanitarian agencies discussed migration control.

Despite being under suspicion for human trafficking, Milad attended the summit, highlighting potential complicity, or at the very least negligence, on the part of Italian authorities.

His presence at this meeting sparked outrage, with many suggesting that European governments were aware of the criminal ties of Libyan officials but chose to turn a blind eye in exchange for cooperation in stemming the flow of migrants to Europe.

The controversy underscored the fraught relationship between European countries, particularly Italy, and Libya over migration. In 2017, Italy brokered a deal with Libya’s UN-recognized government, then led by Fayez Al-Sarraj, to prevent migrant boats from reaching European shores.

As part of the agreement, Italy provided funds, equipment, and training to the Libyan Coast Guard, which was tasked with intercepting migrants and returning them to Libya. However, this strategy has been widely criticized for subjecting migrants to inhumane conditions, including torture and extortion in detention centers controlled by militias.

Rights groups have long condemned the EU’s approach, claiming that by partnering with Libyan authorities, European governments are complicit in the abuses that migrants face once they are returned to Libya.

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Milad, as a central figure in this system, reportedly profited from these arrangements, with accusations that intercepted migrants were held in detention centers where they had to pay bribes for their release.

“Bija was involved in the strategic decisions about the naval assets of the Libyan Coast Guard that would be sent for the interceptions of migrants at sea, as well as being involved in identifying disembarkation points on the coast,” Nancy Porsia, an Italian journalist who has long tracked Milad’s activities, told Arab News.

“The disembarkation points are extremely important when it comes to the main business of detention. In fact, nowadays, the real gain out of human smuggling in Libya is not the organization of sea crossings — rather, it is the business of detention, which is funded by the international community, and also the business of the interceptions.”

Porsia knows only too well how deeply entangled Milad was in the world of criminality. She was given a security detail after Milad threatened her and her family due to her reporting on his human trafficking activities.

Milad’s crimes were not limited to human trafficking, however. He was also reportedly involved in fuel smuggling, using his position in the coast guard to control illicit trade routes in western Libya.

These criminal operations likely helped fuel the wider conflict in Libya, where rival factions and militias have vied for control of resources and territory.

Milad’s close connections with various militias in Zawiya allowed him to operate with impunity for years, despite being the subject of multiple international sanctions.

In 2020, Milad was arrested by Libyan authorities on charges of human trafficking and fuel smuggling. However, after serving only six months in prison, he was released and even promoted within the coast guard.

FASTFACTS

• Abdel-Rahman Milad, or ‘Bija,’ was a former Libyan Coast Guard commander notorious for human trafficking.

• He was killed in Tripoli on Sept. 1, raising concerns about Libya’s political instability and migration control.

His release sparked outrage, with many questioning the Libyan government’s commitment to tackling human trafficking. Milad’s ability to move freely in western Libya despite his criminal background further highlighted the weak rule of law and the power wielded by the militias.

However, Milad’s misdeeds eventually caught up with him. On Sept. 1, he was shot dead while sitting in a chauffeur-driven car in the Sayyad area of Tripoli.

His death was met with mixed reactions. Some Libyan officials, including militia leader Moammar Dhawi and Abdullah Allafi, deputy head of the Presidential Council, have expressed condolences and called for an investigation.

No group has claimed responsibility for the killing, and the motive remains unclear.

Some speculate that his killing could be linked to infighting among Libyan militias or to his potential threats to reveal incriminating information about the dealings between the Libyan Coast Guard and human smuggling networks.

The arrest of Mohamed Bahroun, another militia leader from Zawiya and commander of the First Support Battalion, in connection with Milad’s death adds another layer of complexity to the case, suggesting that the killing may have been the result of a power struggle.

“Bija was killed in the context of the political struggle in his own town, Zawiya,” said Porsia. “For months now, there have been armed confrontations in Zawiya. It is a unique case across the whole of Libya.

“Bija and Bahroun, better known as Al-Far, are competitors because both are officers who, under the table, carry out illicit trafficking, as corrupted officers … Al-Far was in theory the main competitor to Bija. So, it might be true that he ordered this murder.

“Or it might be that it was actually done by the prosecutor’s office to pin this murder, which is of course so political, with strong political consequences, on a character, a player, like Al-Far.”

El-Gomati likewise believes the murder can only be understood in the wider context of Libya’s political and criminal landscape.

“Milad’s assassination isn’t just the silencing of a single man — it’s a power play,” he said. “His death could be seen as a settling of scores, a pre-emptive strike, or a message to others in his network.

“To some, Milad was seen as a hero who built the naval academy and was pushing back against human smuggling. To others in Zawiya, he was a threat to their smuggling networks.

“Bahroun, a key figure in Zawiya’s smuggling underworld, had every reason to see Milad removed, and their rivalry was well documented.

“If he was indeed disrupting Bahroun’s operations, his death could realign the balance of power in Zawiya, giving rival smuggling factions room to expand. The murder sent a message — those who challenge the status quo don’t survive.”

He added: “Bahroun’s arrest might cause a temporary disruption in human trafficking routes, but history shows that new players will quickly fill the void.”

How prosecutors handle the investigation into Bahroun, who handed himself in to authorities voluntarily, could be seen as a test for the rule of law in Libya — determining where power really lies in the troubled country.

“This case is a litmus test for the very concept of rule of law in a fractured state,” said El-Gomati. “Can a country where ‘might often makes right’ suddenly deliver impartial justice? The handling of Milad’s case will either be a turning point or another nail in the coffin of Libya’s legal institutions.”

Milad’s death is a symptom of the larger problems facing Libya. Since Qaddafi’s fall, the country has been divided between rival governments, with the UN-backed administration in the west and the government of military strongman Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar in the east.

“The reality is that the strongest armed groups and figures like Haftar, who escape accountability despite waging war and assassinations, underscore the deep flaws in Libya’s justice system,” said El-Gomati.

“Tripoli’s actions will reveal whether it can enforce true justice this time or merely manage a facade.”

For El-Gomati, the old model of engagement with Libya by foreign powers, including the UN, the EU, Russia, Turkiye, and others, has to change.

“For Libya to break free from this cycle, there needs to be a fundamental shift in how the international community engages,” he said.

“It requires more than just selective sanctions and recycled initiatives. It demands a rethinking of the UN’s roadmap to elections and a commitment to holding all players accountable for their role in its disruption. It needs real consequences for those who exploit the country’s misery.

“Until the rules of the game change, Libya will remain a playground for the powerful and a prison for its people.”

For Porsia, who herself became part of the Milad story after his threats to kill her and her family, the murder has only confirmed her grim assessment that Libya is a “failed state,” run “according to the dynamics of a mafia network.

“After his assassination, I don’t feel safer, in terms of the ability to return to Libya, because the problem is not Bija but the system itself,” she said.

“And then I feel also sorry because it’s a confirmation that Libya is not going to recover from the chaos any time soon, and the murder of Bija itself was an excellent example of a political assassination. And it was done in broad daylight.”

 


Iran says FM in Qatar to meet Hamas leaders

Iran says FM in Qatar to meet Hamas leaders
Updated 56 min 32 sec ago
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Iran says FM in Qatar to meet Hamas leaders

Iran says FM in Qatar to meet Hamas leaders
  • Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was visiting Qatar on Thursday to meet leaders of Tehran-backed Palestinian militant group Hamas, a ministry statement said

TEHRAN: Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was visiting Qatar on Thursday to meet leaders of Tehran-backed Palestinian militant group Hamas, a ministry statement said.
It said he would meet senior Hamas officials “to hail the victory of the Palestinian people through 16 months of legendary resistance” in the Gaza Strip.
On October 7, 2023, Palestinian fighters based in Gaza attacked Israel which then launched an assault on the Palestinian territory.
The fighting later spread to include the Iran-backed group Hezbollah in Lebanon, and also led to direct exchanges between sworn enemies the Islamic republic and Israel.
A ceasefire began on January 19 that will see 33 Israeli hostages captured on October 7, 2023, freed in exchange for 1,900 people — mostly Palestinians — in Israeli custody.
On Tuesday, supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Gaza had brought Israel “to its knees” in the conflict.
“The small, limited Gaza brought the Zionist regime, armed to the teeth and fully supported by America, to its knees,” he said during a meeting in Tehran.
On January 22 in Davos, Switzerland, Iranian Vice President Mohammad Javad Zarif acknowledged that Hamas’s attack on Israel had “destroyed” an opportunity for talks to revive a landmark nuclear accord.


Hamas set to free hostages and Israel to release prisoners as Gaza ceasefire holds

Hamas set to free hostages and Israel to release prisoners as Gaza ceasefire holds
Updated 30 January 2025
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Hamas set to free hostages and Israel to release prisoners as Gaza ceasefire holds

Hamas set to free hostages and Israel to release prisoners as Gaza ceasefire holds
  • The exchange would be the third since the start of a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip that has held for a week and a half
  • Hamas handed female Israeli soldier Agam Berger to the Red Cross at a ceremony in the heavily destroyed urban refugee camp of Jabaliya in northern Gaza

DEIR AL-BALAH: Hamas began the process of freeing three more Israeli hostages and five Thai captives on Thursday, the third such release since a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip took hold earlier this month. Israel was expected to release another 110 Palestinian prisoners.
The truce is aimed at winding down the deadliest aggression on the Gaza strip.
It has held despite a dispute earlier this week over the sequence in which the hostages were released.
Hamas handed female Israeli soldier Agam Berger, 20, to the Red Cross at a ceremony in the heavily destroyed urban refugee camp of Jabaliya in northern Gaza. The Israeli government later confirmed that Berger was with its forces.
Another ceremony was planned in the southern city of Khan Younis, in front of the destroyed home of slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. Both were attended by hundreds of people, including masked militants and onlookers.
In Israel, people cheered, clapped and whistled at a square in Tel Aviv where supporters of the hostages watched Berger’s handover on big screens next to a large clock that’s counted the days the hostages have been in captivity. Some held signs saying: “Agam we’re waiting for you at home.”
Berger was among five young, female soldiers abducted in the Oct. 7 attack. The other four were released on Saturday. The other two Israelis set to be released Thursday are Arbel Yehoud, 29, and Gadi Moses, an 80-year-old man.
There was no official confirmation of the identities of the Thai nationals who will be released.
A number of foreign workers were taken captive along with dozens of Israeli civilians and soldiers during Hamas’ attack. Twenty-three Thais were among more than 100 hostages released during a weeklong ceasefire in November 2023. Israel says eight Thais remain in captivity, two of whom are believed to be dead.
Of the people set to be released from prisons in Israel, 30 are serving life sentences after being convicted of deadly attacks against Israelis. Zakaria Zubeidi, a prominent former militant leader and theater director who took part in a dramatic jailbreak in 2021 before being rearrested days later, is also among those set to be released.
Israel said Yehoud was supposed to have been freed Saturday and delayed the opening of crossings to northern Gaza when she was not.
The United States, Egypt and Qatar, which brokered the ceasefire after a year of tough negotiations, resolved the dispute with an agreement that Yehoud would be released Thursday. Another three hostages, all men, are set to be freed Saturday along with dozens more Palestinian prisoners.
On Monday, Israel began allowing Palestinians to return to northern Gaza, the most heavily destroyed part of the territory, and hundreds of thousands streamed back. Many found only mounds of rubble where their homes had been.
Ceasefire holds for now but next phase will be harder
In the first phase of the ceasefire, Hamas is set to release a total of 33 Israeli hostages, including women, children, older adults and sick or wounded men, in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. Israel says Hamas has confirmed that eight of the hostages to be released in this phase are dead.
Palestinians have cheered the release of the prisoners, who they widely see as heroes who have sacrificed for the cause of ending Israel’s decades-long occupation of lands they want for a future state.
Israeli forces have meanwhile pulled back from most of Gaza, allowing hundreds of thousands of people to return to what remains of their homes and humanitarian groups to surge assistance.
The deal calls for Israel and Hamas to negotiate a second phase in which Hamas would release the remaining hostages and the ceasefire would continue indefinitely. The war could resume in early March if an agreement is not reached.
Israel says it is still committed to destroying Hamas, even after the militant group reasserted its rule over Gaza within hours of the truce. A key far-right partner in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition is already calling for the war to resume after the ceasefire’s first phase.
Hamas says it won’t release the remaining hostages without an end to the war and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.
Israel’s ensuing air and ground war among the deadliest and most destructive in decades. More than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed, over half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were militants.
The Israeli military says it killed over 17,000 fighters, without providing evidence, and that it went to great lengths to try to spare civilians. It blames civilian deaths on Hamas because its fighters operate in dense residential neighborhoods and put military infrastructure near homes, schools and mosques.
The Israeli offensive has transformed entire neighborhoods into mounds of gray rubble, and it’s unclear how or when anything will be rebuilt. Around 90 percent of Gaza’s population has been displaced, often multiple times, with hundreds of thousands of people living in squalid tent camps or shuttered schools.


Palestinian Red Crescent says Israeli strike kills 7 in West Bank

Palestinian Red Crescent says Israeli strike kills 7 in West Bank
Updated 30 January 2025
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Palestinian Red Crescent says Israeli strike kills 7 in West Bank

Palestinian Red Crescent says Israeli strike kills 7 in West Bank
  • The strike occurred in the village of Tamun in northern West Bank, organization says
  • Israeli said its forces were involved in a ‘counterterrorism operation’ in the area

RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: The Palestinian Red Crescent said an Israeli drone strike in a village in the occupied West Bank killed at least seven people on Wednesday, while the military said it had struck an “armed cell.”
“An Israeli strike in the village of Tamun in the northern West Bank killed seven people,” the group said in a statement.
The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah said eight people had been killed.
The Israeli military told AFP its forces were involved in a “counterterrorism operation” in the area.
As part of the operation, an Israeli “aircraft, with the direction of ISA (security agency) intelligence, struck an armed terrorist cell in the area of Tamun,” the military said in a statement.
Violence has soared throughout the West Bank since the war between Hamas and Israel broke out in Gaza on October 7, 2023.
Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 870 Palestinians, including many militants, in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
At least 29 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during Israeli military raids in the territory over the same period, according to official Israeli figures.


First Gaza aid ship arrives at Egypt’s El-Arish port since ceasefire

First Gaza aid ship arrives at Egypt’s El-Arish port since ceasefire
Updated 30 January 2025
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First Gaza aid ship arrives at Egypt’s El-Arish port since ceasefire

First Gaza aid ship arrives at Egypt’s El-Arish port since ceasefire

CAIRO: A Turkish ship docked at Egypt’s El-Arish on Wednesday, delivering the first aid destined for Gaza through the port since a fragile ceasefire went into effect, a Turkish official and Egyptian sources said.
“We are prepared to heal the wounds of our Gazan brothers and sisters and to meet their temporary shelter needs,” Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya posted on X on Wednesday.
The ship was loaded with 871 tons of humanitarian aid, including 300 power generators, 20 portable toilets, 10,460 tents and 14,350 blankets, according to Yerlikaya.
A team from the Egyptian Red Crescent received the Turkish aid to make the necessary arrangements for its delivery to the Strip, a source at the port, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of the Gaza Strip, said.
Two staff from the Egyptian Red Crescent also confirmed its arrival.
Since the start of the truce in the Palestinian territory, hundreds of truckloads of aid have entered Gaza while some has been airlifted in.
The truce between Israel and Hamas came after more than 15 months of war sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.


Syria’s Sharaa: jihadist to interim head of state

Syria’s Sharaa: jihadist to interim head of state
Updated 30 January 2025
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Syria’s Sharaa: jihadist to interim head of state

Syria’s Sharaa: jihadist to interim head of state

DAMASCUS: In less than two months, Syria’s Ahmed Al-Sharaa has risen from rebel leader to interim president, after his Islamist group led a lightning offensive that toppled Bashar Assad.
Sharaa was appointed Wednesday to lead Syria for an unspecified transitional period, and has been tasked with forming an interim legislature after the dissolution of the Assad era parliament and the suspension of the 2012 constitution.
The former jihadist has abandoned his nom de guerre Abu Mohammed Al-Jolani, trimmed his beard and donned a suit and tie to receive foreign dignitaries since ousting Assad from power on December 8.
The tall, sharp-eyed Sharaa has held a succession of interviews with foreign journalists, presenting himself as a patriot who wants to rebuild and reunite Syria, devastated and divided after almost 14 years of civil war.
Syria’s new authorities also announced Wednesday the dissolution of armed factions, including Sharaa’s own Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in the Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda.
Since breaking ties with Al-Qaeda in 2016, Sharaa has sought to portray himself as a more moderate leader, and HTS has toned down its rhetoric, vowing to protect Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities.
But Sharaa has yet to calm misgivings among some analysts and Western governments that still class HTS as a terrorist organization.
“He is a pragmatic radical,” Thomas Pierret, a specialist in political Islam, told AFP.
“In 2014, he was at the height of his radicalism,” Pierret said, referring to the period of the war when he sought to compete with the jihadist Daesh group.
“Since then, he has moderated his rhetoric.”
Born in 1982 in Saudi Arabia, Sharaa is from a well-to-do Syrian family and was raised in Mazzeh, an upscale district of Damascus.
In 2021, he told US broadcaster PBS that his nom de guerre was a reference to his family’s roots in the Golan Heights. He said his grandfather was among those forced to flee the territory after its capture by Israel in 1967.
According to the Middle East Eye news website, it was after the September 11, 2001 attacks that he was first drawn to jihadist thinking.
“It was as a result of this admiration for the 9/11 attackers that the first signs of jihadism began to surface in Jolani’s life, as he began attending secretive sermons and panel discussions in marginalized suburbs of Damascus,” the website said.
Following the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, he left Syria to take part in the fight.
He joined Al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, and was subsequently detained for five years, preventing him from rising through the ranks of the jihadist organization.
In March 2011, when the revolt against Assad’s rule erupted in Syria, he returned home and founded Al-Nusra Front, Syria’s branch of Al-Qaeda.
In 2013, he refused to swear allegiance to Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, who would go on to become the emir of the Daesh group, and instead pledged his loyalty to Al-Qaeda’s Ayman Al-Zawahiri.
A realist in his partisans’ eyes, an opportunist to his adversaries, Sharaa said in May 2015 that he, unlike Daesh, had no intention of launching attacks against the West.
He also proclaimed that should Assad be defeated, there would be no revenge attacks against the Alawite minority that the president’s clan stems from.
He cut ties with Al-Qaeda, claiming to do so in order to deprive the West of reasons to attack his organization.
According to Pierret, he has since sought to chart a path toward becoming a credible statesman.
In January 2017, Sharaa imposed a merger with HTS on rival Islamist groups in northwestern Syria, thereby taking control of swathes of Idlib province that had been cleared of government troops.
In areas under its grip, HTS developed a civil administration and established a semblance of a state in Idlib province, while crushing its rebel rivals.
Throughout this process, HTS faced accusations from residents and human rights groups of brutal abuses against those who dared dissent, which the United Nations has classed as war crimes.