See-Through Salem: Arrested?

May 22, 2012
Last update June 4/5

<< See-Through Salem {Masterlist}

I thank Hurriya for this tip on a new development reported by the Green Libyan Facebook group "شباب ليبيا الأحرار علي الفيس بوك لنشر الحقائق من أجل ليبيا الغد" [Libyan Liberal Youth on Facebook to spread the facts for Libya's Future?] and nowhere else I've seen.

  It's a photo showing armed men in semi-military and civilian clothes carrying a chubby, short, pale-bellied man across a bridge. One wields a club-like object in a seemingly threatening way, and others carry rifles. The attached info, in Arabic, then English Google translation.

 مرتزقة الناتو يضربون ويجرون طبيب في مركز طربلس الطبي _____________________________________________ هذه الصورة ليست في سجن أبوغريب و ليست في معتقل غوانتانامو... !! هذه الصورة في مركز طرابلس الطبي وهكذا تمت معاملة الدكتور "سالم الفرجاني" بعد حضوره لإدارة المركز لاتمام إجراءات التسليم و الاستلام, هذه هي ليبيا الجديدة هذه هي الديمقراطيه هذه هي العدالة وحقوق الأنسان التي وعدوا بها الشعب وخدعوا بها العالم في اوضح صورها وبأيدي من يسمون باللجنة الامنيه العليا المؤقته طربلس

 Auto-translated: NATO mercenaries beating and dragging a doctor at the Tripoli Medical Center _____________________________________________
 This photo is not in the prison of Abu Ghraib, not at Guantanamo Bay ... !! This image in the Tripoli Medical Center, and so has the treatment of Dr. "Salem Ferjani" after attending a management center to complete the procedures for delivery and receipt, this is the new Libya This is the democracy of this is justice and human rights that were promised the people, deceived by the world in the clearest images and the hands of the so-called Committee Supreme Security temporary Tripoli
---
See-through Salem, the transparent fixer of rebel war crimes, fake witness (aka Dr. Salim Rajab/Rajip/Rajub), manager of other poor-performing and over-used fake witnesses, and the NTC's former co-chair of the national missing persons commission, chronicler of Gaddafi crimes, crusader for bereaved familes and the truth, important contact and evidence-gatherer for human rights groups, the UN, and the ICC. Allegedly, now, arrested and dragged out of his workplace by forces ostensibly loyal to the NTC / prevailing NATO-backed militia force.

 Why? Did the NTC suspect he's been pranking them, being way too obvious on their dime and discrediting them more than necessary? For the record, I have wondered if he was doing this on purpose to discredit the NTC with his antics. I think he has done that a bit, with help from me and other site members/contributors. But in reality, he's not much worse than most of the people given the delicate and almost impossible task of fooling people like us. The rebel crime-fixers are all transparent to differing degrees (the other Dr. Salem (Qasr) at AbuSalim trauma hospital, for example). This guy was probably trying to help, just like all the others, and is only an idiot who lacks nuance and discretion.

He should not be killed, tortured, or even dragged out like a criminal like this for being an idiot. If there's another specified crime he's being detained for, I do hope the authorities will publicly announce it.

 I have left some comments, Google Arabic, at that page asking for more information. If I get any more details, from there or anywhere, I'll pass it on here. For now, a blown-up detail of the photo. The resolution is not adequate to tell much in this zoomed-out view, but that could be Dr. Al-Farjami, and the Libyan youth say it is.

May 23: Still awaiting information. Additional postings:

Rebel posting, no arrow, but snowflakes (?) http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?id=196059987096192&l=21096e7d8a&pid=1000592
Auto-translated caption suggests more sympathy to the arrest as lawful: Tripoli Medical Center - some of the counted on "Higher Security Committee" Apply (the law) to the doctor [Salem Ferjani] as shown in the picture

Un-marked, with gunmen named?: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=467993616560638&set=a.217452284948107.69715.217308438295825&type=3&theater
Auto-translated caption suggests a mundane reason for the arrest: "it is Dr. Libby is called d. Salem Ferjani In the Tripoli Medical Center, and Chahdhm carry it assumes Almariz at Abu Ghraib prison, they are members of the Supreme Security Committee of Tripoli, and the story revolves around the minutes of the delivery and receipt of the management of the center and the intransigence of the previous administration in the delivery, although the Ferjani has a mandate from the Ministry of Health to complete the process of receipt."

There are some other reflections, including this tweet from Leo

NATO mercenaries dragging Dr.Salem Ferjani out of the Tripoli medical center: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=337047939701449&set=a.154538474619064.40814.154528817953363&type=1 Thx for your support @matt_vandyke !

I'm not so good with Twitter understanding, but I gather Van Dyke, the pro-rebel journalist/activist was following Leo's stream until he was blocked a few days prior to this arrest. Leo mentions a pro-NTC "Press solidarity" reporting a lot of thing, it seems including this (thanks Petri). http://presssolidarity.net/رئيس-اللجنة-المكلفة-لاستلام-مركز-طراب/
Again, auto translate:

Was yesterday, Monday, Chairman of the Committee in charge of the receipt of the Tripoli Medical Center were attacked by a group, it was said as belonging to the management of the Tripoli Medical Center. According to sources, "news agency solidarity" during an interview that took place between the Director of the Tripoli Medical Center Khaled, Chairman of the Committee conferred upon, receiving center, a number of armed personnel to manage the medical center by dragging and dragging them to a vehicle and taken to an unknown location. Picked up and reported the existence of separate Chairman of the Committee of the Supreme Security Committee. And tried to "news agency solidarity" Contact manager Tripoli Medical Center and Chairman of the Supreme Security Committee and Security Committee of Tripoli and the Ministry of the Interior; to see fuller details about the incident to no avail. News Agency of solidarity - a special

A comment from there adds... something.

Certificate of debt I am the presence of the position the person my father and then his arrest was one of the ousted Imran melons and Alqirdafa has jumped on the doctors and staff at the center with the knowledge that our parents Qdu him are the military police after he himself Bstdaahm and massage for the purpose of the threat and after the submission of documents from one employee to the elements Military Police condemn this person is called a Salem Ferjani Anao was a member of the Revolutionary Committees and the former was arrested by military police and thank you ..

WOW
Update, June 4/5
So, Did that just say he had been part of the Gaddafi-era committees that basically ran things? And he was allowed to take a leading role in the clownish seach for the "truth" of Gaddafi's crimes? That would support all-too-clearly my stranger suspicions here.

The ambiguity we began with is no more. I just got a tip from an astute reader that, yes, this is Dr. Salem. The Guardian has just yesterday reported on it and wow, is this getting interesting. He was beaten and, by some definition, "tortured," but still alive. There's sudden controversy over the identified NTC thug unit that arrested him. He's reportedly been threatened not to speak out, but is speaking out, and is thus reportedly in hiding in Tripoli. I do hope he's picked a good spot, can lay low and keep quiet for the moment, or get away entirely, and let the rest of us hash over his S.O.S. Check this out:
Libya sees claims of beatings and human rights abuses as elections near By Chris Stephen, the Guardian, June 3, 2012.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/03/libya-security-force-kidnapping-surgeon

Some quotes:

Members of an elite unit set up by the Libyan government to rein in the country's rival militia forces have been accused of kidnapping and severely beating one of the country's foremost surgeons. The abduction appears further evidence that 10 months after taking over, Libya's new interim government has failed to curb human rights abuses, and is seemingly incapable of controlling either the militias or its own security force. It comes as the country faces its first national elections later this month – a key test of whether Libya is heading towards democracy or violent secessionism. Salem Forjani, a heart surgeon working for the health ministry, was seized on 17 May when he went to Tripoli medical centre – the city's largest hospital – on orders of the health minister to remove the director, who was accused of links with the Gaddafi regime.

But Salem allegedly had his own G-link, and it was he who was arrested. Was it some kind of set-up? It seems so. Mr. Stephen continues:

Instead, he was confronted by members of the government's supreme security committee (SSC) waiting in the director's office, who dragged Forjani through the hospital, beating him so badly he lost consciousness in front of horrified staff. A fellow medic photographed Forjani being carried, his shirt off, spreadeagled, down the hospital's ambulance ramp while an SSC soldier threatened to shoot unarmed hospital security staff giving chase.

That's the photo. The world thanks this medic, and the others who tried to help. Continueing:

The SSC troops bundled the doctor into a car and incarcerated him in a base at Naklia, a suburb of Tripoli, where he was beaten and kicked so hard in the groin that he was left with a ruptured testicle. Forjani escaped with his life. But for five days neither his family nor health minister Fatima Hamroush could find him, or even get confirmation he was still alive. Finally, after he had been moved to a second facility, at Tripoli's Mitiga airport, the SSC contacted the health ministry and released him, having failed to charge him with any offence or even explain the reason for his capture.

I have a good guess for the reason. It's one that, if true, would remain unstated. On the surface, he's been the essence of anti-Gaddafi, and was so at least from February 2011, he says keeping careful track of what was really happening as the dead and injured came through TMC, keeping files to prove it. (It's the intentional clown theory, but there are others at least as likely that would also be left unstated. There can be little legitimate reason to do this.)

Mr. Stephen reports moves are underway to keep the man safe. "Diplomats are quietly lobbying Libya's government to issue a guarantee of safety for Forjani." Guarantee? Ha. A call returned, and a statement of sympathy, maybe.

Sorry, can't stop quoting:

Now the surgeon is in hiding in Tripoli, having been warned of reprisals if he speaks out. "I don't know how this could happen, this is a new Libya," he told the Guardian. "I kept asking them, who are you, why are you doing this?" 

What has shocked many Libyans, with the photograph now going viral among Facebook users, is that Forjani is a leading light among human rights groups. He sits [sic?] as an expert on the government's missing persons commission and chaired an investigation into a massacre of prisoners by the Gaddafi administration, a report distributed to the United Nations and the international criminal court.

We'll have our own report on that subject fitting that description quite soon. One more update needed, obviously.

His kidnap and torture, and the silence with which it has been met by the government, has left many Libyans fearing for the future. "This is kidnapping," said his brother, Salah, an official with a Libyan human rights group. "It [the SSC] is more powerful than the police and that is the intention."

"It was not supposed to be this way," Stephen continues, explaining the SSC, which I hadn't really heard of. It was established under the interior ministry "as a means for the state to gain control of security from Libya's patchwork of militias." Reportedly drawing its members "from both former rebels and disbanded Gaddafi-era internal security units, has become a law unto itself," one now widely feared in the capitol especially. The hospital's director (see below), and a Health ministry official have been threatened by the SSC, they say, who used their abuse of Al-Farjani as a demonstration.

The NTC "government" hasn't arrested anyone or started an investigation. Stephen reports, the interior ministry refuses to return calls, and an NTC representative cancelled a meeting to discuss it.

Last month, the United Nations special representative, Ian Martin, raised concerns at the UN security council in New York. "The interim mechanism called the supreme security committee, with some 60,000 to 70,000 fighters registered, had, to some extent, provided a unified command," his report states. "It was essential, however, that the committee not become a parallel security."

Yet this is precisely what critics claim the SSC has become. When her official was kidnapped, health minister Hamroush wrote to interim prime minister Abdurrahim el-Keib and president Mustafa Abdul Jalil, begging for help. "We have had no answer," said health ministry official Hussam Bubash.

The mystery of this episode is just mysterious. Consider the director of the TMC, where Al-Farjani ran his alleged operation all those months, whom Farjani was sent to relieve (replace?). Dr Khalid Urayath stands accused of Gaddafi loyalism, and of squandering money on trips abroad (outside of Libya? Gasp!) for hospital staff. But he can't be removed, for some reason. He says he in fact tutored Muammar Gaddafi's mysterious daughter Hannah, explaining "The best cardiovascular surgeon in the country is me, very humble to say it. You cannot say no to the Colonel." He's also "a fellow of the UK's Royal College of Surgeons," the report adds, who just last month "secured an offer of computer equipment from the British Libyan business council."

Dr Khalid Urayath – the director of Tripoli medical centre, whom Forjani was sent to relieve – remains unrepentant. He is refusing to step down, saying he is supported by hospital staff and this makes irrelevant the wishes of the health minister. Forjani's kidnap came during the fourth attempt this year by health ministry officials to order Urayath to step down. When he refused, Forjana, acting on instructions from the health minister, called the general prosecutor's office to ask for help from law enforcement officers.

Did they set him up and have him call the thugs on himself? Again, they were waiting for him "in the director's office" when he got there. The SSC thugs working with the alleged loyalist? (What had happened during the previous failed efforts of an alleged loyalist sent to get rid of an accused loyalist?)

"He was calling on armed forces," said Urayath. "You know why they [the SCC] used force on him? Dr Salem (Forjana) was trying to escape down the stairs – he was trying to escape. They took him in care and took him to the site of the SSC, they put him there, they interrogated him."

This guy sounds off. They took Salem in and beat his gonads to a pulp because he tried to escape? The thing he wanted to escape from, perhaps connected to the interrogation, the why behind the why, is left unexplained.

...following Urayath's refusal to step down, the health ministry's plans to reform a health service left in chaos by the Gaddafi dictatorship are in tatters.

Yes, blame the "brutal 42-year rule" when all the sickeningly shitty parts of it are only surfacing the last year or so. There will surely be more news on this, and I'll try to stay abreast of it.