After stepping off an aircraft belonging to the Italian secret services, Osama Najim was triumphantly carried on the shoulders of the crowd of supporters awaiting his arrival at Tripoli’s Mitiga airport.
Najim, also called Almasri, was not a footballer bringing home a trophy but a police chief wanted by the international criminal court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, including alleged murder, torture, enslavement, rape and sexual violence.
Two days earlier, Najim had been arrested by Italian police after the ICC had issued an arrest warrant. But the Italian government failed to validate the warrant and instead provided a government plane to fly him home from Turin.
As Tripoli celebrated, in Rome there was outrage and dismay. Opposition leaders demanded answers from Giorgia Meloni’s government, as critics accused Italy’s leadership of pa...
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