Inner City Press -- Investigative Reporting From the Inner City to Wall Street to the United Nations

In Libya, As Treki's Former Staffer Speaks for Rebels, Treki Asylum Predicted, Old Charges on Hold

UNITED NATIONS, March 9 -- When Libya's Gaddafi government wrote to the UN to remove its previous ambassadors Ibrahim Dabbashi and Shalgam, then to offer former President of the General Assembly Ali Treki as a replacement, many uncomfortable questions were raised, most still without answer.

  When Treki was President of the General Assembly, Inner City Press questioned him about abuse of human rights, and also about nepotism -- hiring in the PGA's office his daughter Amal Ali Treki and another relative Ali Mohamed Treki -- and diverting discline when his daughter hosted a KFC Colonel Sanders impersonator in front of the Security Council - click here for that.

  In the course of receiving generally unsatisfying answers, Inner City Press came to know Treki's staff.

The leader of Treki's transition office when he became PGA was Ahmed Gebreel, then with Libya's Mission to the UN. Now on March 9, Gebreel has appeared on BBC Hardtalk, as an adviser to the rebels in Bengazi. Last month, Gebreel sent out a plea to contacts at the UN, including that

“almost 200 were buried in Benghazi , and the security forces shot them killing more than 11 , and more in other cities. The protesters are civil people, they are led by lawyers, professors and even diplomats. They don't have any link to Islamic radical groups as Gaddafi's media trying to convince outside world. The Internet has been cut off in the entire country for the last 4 days, we can't make international calls, media people or anyone who has any link to NGOs or International organizations are not allowed to come in to Libya. So outside world don't know what is happening in Libya. To write this Email, I had to drive more than 800KM to Egypt. People are determined to get rid of this regime, but you know the behavior of the Gaddafi. if you stood up this might not happen with a high cost. The Libyan military forces have joined the protesters in most of the cities, and sometimes they are fighting the foreign Mercenaries.”

On Hardtalk on March 9, former UK Ambassador to the UN Jeremy Greenstock said that if Responsibility to Protect applies in Libya, it also applies in “Burma, North Korea, Zimbabwe, Eastern Congo and Sudan.”

Gebreel replied that Libya is different because “some things” prevent intervention in Burma and North Korea. Greenstock predicted that China and Russia would veto military action in Libya.

At the UN, Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky says that Treki has not yet arrived and sought a pass to enter the building.

  Inner City Press is informed that Treki says he has not even said “yes” to being appointed Gaddafi's UN Ambassador. The idea is that Treki just wants to get his family out of Libya, then may go into exile. He seems to think he could play a role in a post-Gaddafi Libya.

There may be another reason for Treki not to come to the UN: as Gebreel and other former Treki staffers know, Treki was the subject of sexual harassment allegations while he was PGA. Inner City Press was told not to report on the charges, or the complainant would be treated even worse. Watch this site.