Gaddafi son charged with assault

2008-07-18 07:26

Geneva - The youngest son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was arrested and charged in Switzerland for allegedly beating up two of his servants, said his lawyer on Thursday.

Hannibal Gaddafi and his wife were taken into police custody on Tuesday after an incident at a luxury hotel in Geneva, lawyer Alain Berger told Swiss radio.

The couple, who faced charges of bodily harm, making threats and coercion, were released on bail Thursday, he said.

Geneva magistrate Michel-Alexandre Graber could not be reached for comment on Thursday. A phone call to Libya's embassy in the Swiss capital, Bern, went unanswered.

Berger said Gaddafi had spent the last two evenings in detention. His pregnant wife, who came to Geneva to give birth, was transferred to a maternity unit, Berger said.

Gaddafi, wife reject allegations

The Swiss daily Tribune de Geneve reported that two of Gaddafi's domestic servants claimed Gaddafi and his wife repeatedly beat them at the President Wilson Hotel, which was just next door to the United Nations' human rights office.

The pair allegedly hit the servants with a belt and a hanger, the report said. It said a Tunisian woman was taken to hospital.

Berger said Gaddafi and his wife rejected the allegations.

The 32-year-old Gaddafi had had previous run-ins with the law. In 2005, he was convicted by a French court for striking his pregnant companion in a Paris hotel.

He was given a four-month suspended prison sentence and a $790 fine.

Hannibal Gaddafi also was at the centre of a separate commotion in 2004, after Paris police stopped him for speeding on the Champs-Elyses and his bodyguards attacked several officers.

Two of the bodyguards were taken into custody but released after a delegation from the Libyan Embassy showed up at the police station and apologised. Gaddafi, who had diplomatic immunity, was not detained.

- AP