Libya

RAPID ACTION NETWORK

9 March 2006

Libya: Internet journalist freed in mass amnesty

The Writers in Prison Committee of English PEN welcomes the release on 2 March 2006 of Abd al-Raziq al-Mansuri. The internet writer was freed along with roughly 130 political prisoners and prisoners of conscience.

Abd al-Raziq al-Mansuri was arrested on 12 January 2005 in Tobruk by Officers of the Internal Security Agency, a government office which mainly deals with national security. He spent four months incommunicado before formal charges were brought against him. He was eventually sentenced to eighteen months' imprisonment on 19 October 2005.

During 2004, al-Mansuri had written numerous articles for the United Kingdom-based Akhbar Libya website (www.akhbar-libya.com) in which he criticised various aspects of Libyan government and society. The same website has since reported that the journalist apparently broke his pelvis falling from a prison bunk bed, and that he was not being given proper medical care and treatment.

Although the charge on which the sentence was based was "the possession of a gun without a licence", there were strong indications that this had been trumped up by the authorities and that al-Mansuri was being punished for his dissenting views and writings.

English PEN welcomes the amnesty granted to Abd al-Raziq al-Mansuri but is concerned that he was imprisoned at all when the charges against him appeared to be fallacious.