The family of missing Imam Moussa Al Sadr is suing Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi on a charge of kidnapping the spiritual head of Lebanon's Shiite community during an official visit to Tripoli at the end of the 1970s.
The lawsuit against Gadhafi and 17 other senior Libyan government officials was filed Tuesday by the missing Imam's son, Sadruddin Al Sadr at the office of Lebanon's State Prosecutor Adnan Addoum, demanding a trial before a Beirut supreme court, An Nahar website reported on Wednesday.
The wives of Sheikh Mohammed Yacoub and journalist Abbas Badreddin, the two companions who disappeared with the Imam during the Libyan visit on Aug. 31, 1978, have also pressed abduction charges against the Libyan ruler, the Lebanese publication added. They are Imtithal Suleiman, Yacoub's wife, and Zahra Yazbeck, Badreddin's wife.
Attorney Shibli Mallat has initiated the lawsuit on behalf of the three plaintiffs, mentioning among the 17 accused Libyan officials former Deputy Prime Minister Abdul Salam Jalloud and former Libyan ambassador to Lebanon Ashour al Firtass.
Addoum said he would review the case and decide whether or not a trial would be held before a Lebanese court.
Sadr was born on the 15th of May 1928 in the famous Iranian city of Qum. In 1960, he came to Lebanon to hold the position of the Islamic Shiite religious leader in the southern city of Tyre following the death of Sayyed Abdelhussein Sharafeddine.
In March 1974, Sadr founded the "Movement of the Deprived" to campaign against the government's negligence of rural areas. After the start of the Lebanese civil war, the Shi'ite Amal group was established as the movement's military arm. (albawaba.com)
© 2004 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
