Executions in Eastern Libya: A Growing Crisis of Rule of Law and Human Rights

By Global News Desk

In a chilling development that marks a regressive turn for the North African nation, the Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF), the dominant military power in eastern and southern Libya, has carried out at least 31 executions since late August 2026. These acts represent the first state-sanctioned executions in the country since 2010, effectively ending a 16-year de facto moratorium on the death penalty. Human rights monitors, including Human Rights Watch, have warned that these killings are the byproduct of "grossly unfair" military trials and that at least 50 additional detainees currently held in the notorious Gernada military prison are at imminent risk of the same fate.

The Resumption of State-Sanctioned Killing: Main Facts

The escalation in state violence began on August 23, when the LAAF military prosecutor announced the execution of 10 individuals by firing squad. These men had been convicted of murder and terrorism-related offenses. However, documentation by international human rights organizations suggests the scope of the crackdown is significantly wider, with the death toll reaching at least 31 by September 10.

The LAAF, led by General Khalifa Haftar, continues to utilize military courts to try civilians—a practice that stands in direct opposition to international human rights law and recent domestic legal rulings. The trials are characterized by profound procedural deficiencies: they are held in secret, defendants are denied access to independent legal counsel, and the evidence presented is frequently based on coerced confessions extracted under extreme physical and psychological duress.

A Chronology of Judicial Breakdown

The current crisis is not an isolated event but the culmination of years of eroding judicial independence in eastern Libya.

• 2014–2018: During the intense armed conflict between the LAAF and various opposing factions in Derna and Benghazi, hundreds of individuals were detained. Many of those now facing the firing squad were arrested during this period.
• 2018–2021: The LAAF began systematically using military courts to target real or perceived political critics. During this period, hundreds of civilians were convicted in sham trials, with at least 22 sentenced to death.
• November 2025: In a landmark ruling, the constitutional chamber of Libya’s Supreme Court declared that Law No. 4/2017—which granted military courts jurisdiction over civilians in cases involving "terrorism" or "crimes against the state"—was unconstitutional. Despite this legal barrier, the LAAF proceeded with its executions.
• August–September 2026: The LAAF defied both the Supreme Court’s ruling and international norms, commencing a series of executions. Even in cases where higher military courts had previously commuted death sentences to life imprisonment, the LAAF proceeded to execute the defendants, signaling a total disregard for even the military’s own internal judicial processes.

Supporting Data: Anatomy of a Sham Trial

The procedural failures documented by Amnesty International and other monitors paint a picture of a judicial system that operates outside the rule of law. The evidence suggests that the "Internal Security Agency," an armed group affiliated with the LAAF, is the primary entity responsible for the torture of detainees to force confessions.

Violations of Due Process

Independent observers have highlighted several critical breaches of the right to a fair trial:

• Lack of Transparency: Trials are held in total secrecy. Families, journalists, and independent observers are barred from the proceedings.
• Inadequate Defense: Defendants are frequently denied the right to choose their own lawyers. Those who are provided legal counsel are rarely permitted to communicate with them in private, and lawyers are often restricted from accessing evidence or cross-examining witnesses.
• Absence of Written Judgments: In many instances, the LAAF has handed down capital sentences without providing defendants or their legal teams with written, reasoned judgments. This prevents any meaningful possibility of appeal.
• The "Secret Burial" Policy: The state’s refusal to hand over bodies to families is a final, cruel act of state-inflicted trauma. Authorities have coerced relatives into identifying the deceased, only to bury the bodies in secret locations and explicitly forbid funeral rites, causing severe, ongoing mental anguish to the families of the victims.

The Legal and Human Rights Implications

Trying civilians in military courts is fundamentally incompatible with international human rights standards, which dictate that civilians must be tried before independent, impartial civilian tribunals. In the context of eastern Libya, the "judges" and "prosecutors" are often members of the LAAF or its allied militias, creating a profound conflict of interest.

The use of the death penalty itself remains a focal point of global concern. Human Rights Watch maintains that capital punishment is inherently inhumane, irreversible, and susceptible to systemic bias and error. With 92 countries having ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the global trend leans heavily toward abolition. By choosing to resume executions, the LAAF is moving in the opposite direction of the international community.

Official Responses and International Responsibility

The United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) and the Tripoli-based Government of National Unity (GNU) have both issued formal condemnations of the executions. However, the influence of these bodies remains limited given the deep fragmentation of the Libyan state.

Bassam Khawaja, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch, emphasized the responsibility of international stakeholders:

"Every execution carried out under these conditions is an irreversible injustice, and every government with influence over the LAAF should be pressing hard to stop the next one."

The international community, particularly those nations that provide training, funding, or political legitimacy to the LAAF, face a moral and strategic imperative. By failing to exert pressure on General Haftar to halt these executions, these states risk being viewed as complicit in the normalization of extrajudicial killing and the erosion of the Libyan justice sector.

Conclusion: A Nation at a Crossroads

Libya remains a nation split by competing authorities, with the Tripoli-based GNU controlling the west and the LAAF controlling the east and south. In both territories, the justice sector is characterized by polarization, outdated legislation, and the influence of unaccountable militias.

The path forward, according to legal experts, requires a complete separation of military and civilian jurisdiction. Military courts must be restricted to adjudicating military offenses committed strictly by military personnel. Furthermore, all civilians currently detained or prosecuted by military courts require an urgent, independent review of their cases to ensure they receive a fair trial or are released immediately.

The resumption of executions is a "shattering" of a long-standing moratorium that had, until August 2026, preserved the lives of countless individuals despite the chaotic political landscape. As the clock ticks for the 50 detainees currently held in Gernada prison, the international community must decide whether it will stand by as the LAAF continues its campaign of violence, or whether it will leverage its diplomatic, financial, and political capital to prevent further irreversible loss of life.

The situation in Libya is a stark reminder that when the rule of law is sacrificed for the consolidation of power, it is the most vulnerable who pay the ultimate price. The eyes of the world are now fixed on eastern Libya, waiting to see if common humanity will prevail over the machinery of death.