REFUGEE TRIBUNAL: Refugees in Libya vs. Italian Ministers and EU Officials

Rome, 18/10/2025 and Brussels, 4/11/2025

1.   Tribunal opening speech

-        The international community created the system of criminal justice after one of the darkest chapters of human history. They said: never again. They built courts in The Hague, they called it international justice, and they promised that those who commit crimes against humanity would be held accountable, no matter how powerful they are.

-        But in Libya, in the Mediterranean, and in Europe, that promise is not being fulfilled. In Libya militias kill migrants, torture and rape them on behalf of the EU and its member states. Libya, Italy and the EU have committed CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY.

The 2023 UN Fact-finding report on Libya found that “crimes against humanity were committed against migrants in places of detention under the actual or nominal control of Libya’s Directorate for Combating Illegal Migration, the Libyan Coast Guard and the Stability Support Apparatus. The crimes are Torture, Rape, Enslavement (including sexual slavery) and other inhumane acts including starvation. These entities received technical, logistical and monetary support from the European Union and its member States for, inter alia, the interception and return of migrants.”

These crimes have victims, and they deserve the truth, justice, and reparation for their suffering. These crimes also have perpetrators, who shall be named, shamed, and brought to justice. Yet, the courts tell the world they have no competence, that they can do nothing.

When the international justice system abandons and fails those who need protection, we cannot stay silent. We are forced to hold our own tribunal: the Libya Refugee Tribunal. We are two Judges, one prosecutor, and hundreds of witnesses. The accused will be named. The survivors will testify. The perpetrators will be judged. And we will pronounce the verdict that international justice has refused to give. We do this as a last resort, because we know the crimes, we have seen the criminals, and the victims carry the evidence in their bodies and in their memories.

2. Prosecutor Speech

In front of you, you have individuals criminally responsible for the suffering and deaths of thousands of refugees and migrants in Libya. The individuals accused have trained, equipped, coordinated and financed criminal militias with the intention to keep migrants and refugees away from Europe through all sorts of abuses.

These are European Union officials and Italian Ministers whose racism-driven policies have resulted in egregious and atrocious crimes against humanity targeting Black migrants and refugees:

• Arbitrary detention

• Kidnapping

• Inhumane and degrading treatment

• Human trafficking

• Rape and other forms of sexual violence

• Slavery

• Torture

• Extra-judicial killings and murder

• Pushbacks

• Deaths at sea

These crimes have been committed with such gravity and large scale that they counter human nature. They are CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY. Here are the individuals accused of these crimes:

-        Carlo Nordio, minister of justice, you are accused of obstruction of justice for ignoring an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court and freeing al-masri, the libyan war criminal, a bloody murderer and torturer leading the Libyan judicial police.

-        Alfredo Mantovano, undersecretary to the presidency of the council, acused of conspiring to obstruct justice, for freeing al-masri the libyan war criminal, for illegal surveillance and for training, equipping and supporting criminal militias. You are accused of committing crimes against humanity in Libya and at sea

-       Matteo Piantedosi, MINISTER OF INTERIOR: accused of multiple homicides for ignoring the duty to rescue people at sea and for obstructing search and rescue operations. You are also accused of stealing tens of thousands of euros from civil sea rescue boats. Finally, you are also accused of training, equipping and supporting criminal militias in Libya. You are accused of committing crimes against humanity in Libya and at sea

-     Giorgia Meloni, PRIME MINISTER accused for conspiring to obstruct justice, for freeing al-Masri the LIBYAN war criminal, for, for illegal surveillance and for training, equipping and supporting criminal militias. You are accused of committing crimes against humanity in Libya and at sea

-        Magnus Brunner, Commissioner for Internal Affairs and Migration in the European Commission, you stand accused of facilitating gross violations of human rights and of the sanctity of life by providing financing and political legitimacy to the so-called Libyan coast guard as well as continued support for inhumane detention facilities known to endanger the life and dignity of Black migrants and refugees.

- Stefano Sannino, Directorate-General for the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf, you currently supervise the border externalisation projects and stand charged with direct complicity in years of abuse and the state-sanctioned murder of thousands of migrants across the Mediterranean and Atlantic

- Dubravka Šuica the Croatian Commissioner responsible for the Mediterranean in the second von der Leyen Commission, you stand accused of complicity in the ongoing bloodshed of migrants in Libya and at sea through your participation in meetings and coordination with Frontex and Libyan representatives.

- Hans Lejtens, executive director of Frontex, you stand accused of complicity in some of the most egregious violations of human rights committed against people on the move. Under your leadership, the agency’s use of drones, aircraft, and intelligence-sharing with Libyan authorities has facilitated the interception, arbitrary detention, and torture of migrants and refugees in Libya and at sea.

- Rosamaria Gili, deputy managing director for middle east and north Africa at the European External Action Service responsible for setting policy on Libya. you stand charged with enabling the funding training and equipping of Libyan criminal forces to prevent refugees from seeking safety.

- Nicola Orlando, EU ambassador to Libya who meets with criminal militias to "improve cooperation on migration" you are charged for funding training and equipping Libyan criminal forces to prevent refugees from seeking safety through arbitrary detention, extrajudicial killings, torture, sexual violence, and slavery

3. Refugee Witnesses:

- Mubarak (not his real name)

I am Sudanese, I have been in Libya for 3 years. Living here in Libya has really been tough for me because I got detained several times. I was detained in a prison called Cigin, in the desert bordering to Tunisia for three months and they only released me after paying them money .And the other prison where I was detained was Ainzara, guarded by the DCIM. I was there for forty five days where I was taken to work a very hard work. While working they always keep pointing guns on me.

I don’t know what to do I just put everything on God. If I really have a voice I would definitely call the world and human help to see what’s happening in Libya. Even now I’m not the regular person I use to be because I was tortured too much by the militias. Sometimes they used to push us to cross the sea by force or else you will be threatened.

I was caught 4 times by the Coast Guard trying to cross the sea. The torturing is horrible I swear. Sometimes if they get too many people in the boat they have to throw some of them to the water.

It is so hard for Africans to live in Libya, because Libyans never let people of different countries live in safety. Life in Libya is not easy for foreigners. Libyan people made an attack recently where we were chased out of normal homes and now we sleeping on the sea shore, sometimes under trees during night hours. Police officers always keep chasing us down the street places where we use to hustle from. It has become very hard to survive.

I’m still here in Libya and the streets are very hard to survive in works are no where to be find these

Libyans use migrants to work in their home, and after that instead of paying them back sometimes they kidnap them.

Escaping Libya is also a big problem. Billions of people are dying here in different ways: they put us in prison with no reason.

We have lost a lot of people in here without anyone knowing. We try to escape from Libya but we are always brought back to Libyan deadly prisons, where you are not liberated unless by paying money. If you can’t pay and you get sick in the prison no one will care, and you will die inside and not be buried.

Another message to other nations of the world: why do you give Libyan coast guard a faster boat to catch people from running away from Libya? You need to help to make the life of migrants in Libya better and safer instead.

Ibrahima Bah

Ibrahima Bah is a young Senegalese asylum seeker who survived a shipwreck in the English Channel in 2022 as a teenager and survived 2 years in Libya. He has been unjustly prosecuted and cruelly imprisoned for the deaths of two of his crew, one of whom was his best friend under the racist British border regime and is now serving a 9 and a half year sentence. Ibrahima was only 17 when he steered the inflatable dinghy saving 43 lives in the shipwreck despite threats towards his life by the smugglers. When Ibrahima was even younger, he made the perilous journey across Libya towards Europe in which he spent two years in Libyan dungeons surviving torture from Libyan militias, paid for, trained and supported by collaborators in this very building. While in British prison for almost a decade of his life, in fact, it’s his birthday today - Ibrahima has given us this testimony to share:

In Libya, I was in a place called Zawiya. I was there for 2 years. One day, it was in Ramadan, we got a call from the guy whose house we were living in. They said today, you’re going to Italy because we paid the money already. The guy is called Amahd Adayo, he put us in one room for five days. We were drinking toilet water, we had no food and no showers. On the sixth day he came and brought 5 people to talk to us by the sea when we were there. Then we entered the sea hungry with no water or nothing and there were children and women. The guy, Amahd Adayo, I saw him take one woman and in front of everybody he is having sex with the woman who is crying but they don’t care. There were 10 or more than 10, I can’t remember who were there holding guns so no one could do anything to them and when they finished with the women they gave us the boat to go to Italy. When we went for 5 kilometres in the sea, they followed us again. They had a light so powerful and they were telling us the boat needed to stop. The guy driving the boat said he’s not going stop so the boat broke and everyone fell into the sea, 5 people died. Those that died was because they were shot and the one who is responsible is Amahd Adayo and his group Zawia. I was locked up underground and again it was only me and the two women they had sex with. They put me there underground with a prisoner who was there for 7 years. I remember that happened around 3 o’clock in the morning. Who was responsible for that? It’s the guy I tell you, Amahd Adayo and his group because in Libya there is no president. The place is called Worsoufana, their group is more than 1000 men and they are so powerful in that place, they kidnap anyone. If they get rid of that group it’s very good but it’s not only that place, it’s all of Libya. I don’t believe Libya is a good place for someone to be

4. The verdict

Having examined the testimonies, evidence, and submissions presented before this Tribunal, and guided by principles of international law - including the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998), the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1973), and customary norms of international humanitarian and human-rights law - this People’s Tribunal finds the accused guilty of crimes against humanity, including murder, persecution, enslavement, deportation, torture, and apartheid, as defined under Articles 7(1) and 7(2) of the Rome Statute.

These crimes have been committed as part of a widespread and systematic attack directed against civilian populations - specifically refugees, asylum seekers, and Black and racialised migrants - across the Mediterranean region and in Libyan detention facilities, with the knowledge, participation, and complicity of European Union, Italian and other Member State officials.

The Tribunal recognises that the coordinated actions of the accused form part of a broader system of racial governance and apartheid, as defined under Article II of the Apartheid Convention (1973) and Article 7(2)(h) of the Rome Statute, whereby institutionalised practices of segregation, inhumane detention, and violent exclusion target migrants on the basis of race, nationality, and perceived irregularity.

The Tribunal therefore declares that:

• The actions and omissions of the accused constitute crimes against humanity under international law;

• These crimes were committed knowingly and systematically as part of a policy of deterrence, externalisation, and racialised border control;

• The accused bear individual criminal responsibility, as well as political and moral culpability, for the deaths, disappearances, and suffering of thousands of migrants and refugees in Libya and at sea.

  
  

Accordingly, this Tribunal finds the following persons guilty of all charges:

1. Magnus Brunner - Commissioner for Internal Affairs and Migration, European CommissionGuilty of complicity in crimes against humanity, including torture and persecution, through the financing and political legitimisation of cooperation with the so-called Libyan Coast Guard; of enabling unlawful detention and enslavement through continued EU support for Libyan detention centres; and of persecution on racial and national grounds in violation of Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute.

2. Dubravka Šuica - Croatian Commissioner responsible for the Mediterranean, Second von der Leyen Commission

Guilty of complicity in crimes against humanity through participation in EU–Libya cooperation mechanisms that resulted in unlawful interceptions, arbitrary detention, and enslavement; of negligent omission by failing to prevent practices amounting to persecution and enforced disappearance; and of contributing to racialised governance of mobility through coordination with Frontex and Libyan representatives.

3. Stefano Sannino - Director-General for the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf, European External Action Service

Guilty of supervising and coordinating border-externalisation projects responsible for systemic human-rights abuses, mass refoulement, and deaths of migrants; of complicity in murder and persecution through partnerships with regimes and militias implicated in torture and extrajudicial killings; and of embedding migration deterrence and racial exclusion within EU foreign policy as a form of institutionalised apartheid.

4. Hans Leijtens - Executive Director of Frontex (European Border and Coast Guard Agency)

Guilty of direct complicity in crimes against humanity through Frontex surveillance and intelligence-sharing operations facilitating interceptions and returns to Libya; of aiding and abetting enforced disappearances through cooperation with entities engaged in torture and slavery; and of persecution and apartheid by criminalising the movement of racialised populations.

5. Rosamaria Gili - Deputy Managing Director for the Middle East and North Africa (European External Action Service responsible for setting policy on Libya)

Guilty of direct complicity in crimes against humanity; of aiding and abetting enforced disappearances through cooperation with entities engaged in torture and slavery; and of persecution and apartheid by criminalising the movement of racialised populations.

6. Nicola Orlando, EU ambassador to Libya

Guilty of direct complicity in crimes against humanity; of aiding and abetting enforced disappearances through cooperation with entities engaged in torture and slavery; and of persecution and apartheid by criminalising the movement of racialised populations

7. Carlo Nordio, Italian minister of justice, we declare you guilty of obstruction of justice.

8.     Alfredo Mantovano, Italian undersecretary to the presidency of the council we declare you guilty of obstructing justice, of illegal surveillance and of committing crimes against humanity in Libya and at sea

9.     Matteo Piantedosi, Italian Minister of Interior: we declare you guilty of homicide for ignoring the duty to rescue people at sea, of obstructing search and rescue operations. Guilty of complicity in crimes against humanity, including torture and persecution, through the financing and political legitimisation of cooperation with the so-called Libyan Coast Guard; of enabling unlawful detention and enslavement through continued Italian support for Libyan detention centres; and of persecution on racial and national grounds in violation of Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute.

10.  Giorgia Meloni, Italian Prime Minister: guilty of obstruction of justice, of illegal surveillance. Also Guilty of complicity in crimes against humanity, including torture and persecution, through the financing and political legitimisation of cooperation with the so-called Libyan Coast Guard; of enabling unlawful detention and enslavement through continued Italian support for Libyan detention centres; and of persecution on racial and national grounds in violation of Article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute

Final Declaration

This People’s Tribunal affirms that the actions and policies of the accused represent a continuation of colonial structures of racial violence and exclusion, violating the most fundamental principles of international law and human dignity. Their collective conduct constitutes crimes against humanity and apartheid under the Rome Statute and Apartheid Convention.

The Tribunal therefore declares all seven accused guilty on all counts.

Their actions have contributed to the deaths, suffering, and dehumanisation of thousands of migrants and refugees in Libya and at sea and stand as an affront to the conscience of humanity.

The accused have been found guilty. As a compensation for their crimes, we order them to:

-       Immediately suspend all support to Libyan criminal militias, suspend the Memorandum of Understanding with Libya

-       Issue humanitarian visas to Italy to all those refugees and migrants who have suffered crimes against humanity in Libya

-       Financially compensate all those refugees and migrants who have suffered crimes against humanity in Libya

-       Officially apologize for the harm caused to refugees and migrants

 To all the survivors who gave witness: you are heard. You did not deserve this. You are strong and deserve justice, protection and dignity. Thank you for your bravery. Let this be the first step to recognize you, and to end the suffering of your brothers and sisters in Libya and beyond.

To the Peoples of Italy and Europe: this tribunal did not condemn you for the crimes against humanity committed by these individuals and your governments. But we remind you that these crimes have been committed in your name and with your money. We call on you to take responsibility for the actions of your governments, to listen to survivors, and to take a stance against these egregious crimes. It is in your hands to stop the crimes being committed in Libya.