Who Killed Gaddafi

Did Gaddafi “pass away” or was he executed?

Reuter

26 October 2011

Libya’s Deputy U.N. Ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi on Wednesday responded to calls from United Nations officials and human rights groups for an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death of long-time Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi shortly after his capture on Oct. 20 near his hometown of Sirte.

Dabbashi told the U.N. Security Council that soldiers loyal to the National Transitional Council (NTC) who captured Gaddafi did not summarily execute him. Rather, Gaddafi died of wounds he had sustained prior to his capture, he said.

“Gaddafi was injured in the course of the clashes between his loyalists and the revolutionaries,” Dabbashi said. “When he was arrested, he was bleeding from his abdomen and head and he passed away (upon) his arrival to the hospital in Misrata. … According to initial reports, none of the revolutionaries fired at him after arresting him.”

Libya’s interim prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, has said that a stray bullet fired by one of Gaddafi’s own guards during a shootout with government forces might have killed the man who ruled the oil-producing North African state for 42 years. Gaddafi had been trying to escape the siege of Sirte when his convoy was hit by a NATO air strike. Dabbashi said the NTC was investigating Gaddafi’s death.

Video footage showing a dazed and bloodied Gaddafi still alive after being captured, and further footage showing him dead a few minutes later, has fueled speculation that the Libyan fighters quickly finished off their despised leader in the heat of the moment.

Will we ever know who killed Gaddafi?