ICC Hears Khaled Mohamed Ali El Hishri Torture Case Over Mitiga Prison Abuses

Khaled Mohamed Ali El Hishri, a former Libyan militia commander accused of war crimes including murder, rape, enslavement and torture, appeared before the International Criminal Court in The Hague on Tuesday over alleged crimes committed between May 2014 and June 2020 at Mitiga prison near Tripoli.

“Seif al-Islam Kadhafi, one of the sons of the former dictator, was sentenced to death in absentia on Tuesday by a Libyan court”

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ICC deputy prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan told the court that El Hishri was “widely known as a notorious torturer at the help of Mitiga prison,” and she said judges found “reasonable grounds” to believe he bears individual criminal responsibility.

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France 24 reported that judges will have 60 days to determine whether the charges against El Hishri—covering 17 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity—are credible enough to proceed to a full trial.

The New Arab said El Hishri was arrested in Germany in July 2025 and later surrendered to the ICC, with hearings concluding on 21 May and judges having 60 days to assess whether prosecutors have sufficient evidence to proceed to trial.

In the opening of the case for the prosecution, Nazhat Shameem Khan said a witness described El Hishri as being “amongst the worst instigators of violence,” and France 24 said another witness described him as being nicknamed “the Angel of Death.”

The Guardian quoted Allison West, a senior legal adviser at the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, saying, “It is a really important development,” and it added that the hearing is the first case in the ICC’s Libya investigation that has been ongoing for more than 15 years.

France 24

Survivor David Yambio, who was held in Mitiga prison between 2019 and 2020, told The Guardian that “Now [Hishri] is in front of the court, it sends a strong message to perpetrators wherever they are.”

The Guardian also reported that defence lawyers are expected to challenge the jurisdiction of the ICC and have called for El Hishri’s release, while campaigners said Germany’s arrest and surrender of the suspect to the court mattered.

The New Arab said the ICC case is linked to alleged abuses at Mitiga prison and described rights groups’ concerns that abuses remain ongoing, rooted in a system of fragmented authority and overlapping networks of militias and state-linked actors.

“Libyan former prison boss known as 'Angel of Death' faces International Criminal Court Former prison boss Khaled Mohamed Ali El Hishri was "one of the worst instigators" of torture, rape and murder in Libya's notorious Mitiga prison, prosecutors told the International Criminal Court Tuesday”

France 24

It reported that SOS Humanity said refugees and migrants intercepted at sea by the so-called Libyan Coast Guard are routinely returned to detention, where they face torture, exploitation and extortion, and it quoted Wasil Schauseil saying, “This is clearly a violent and systematic pattern.”

The Guardian framed the hearing as a landmark step toward “justice, truth, reparation and deterrence” for abuses of refugees trying to reach Europe from Africa, and it said the Special Deterrence Force ran detention sites in western Libya that filled with refugees detained in Libya or intercepted by the Libyan coastguard.

The New Arab added that more than 27,000 people were intercepted and returned to Libya in 2025, with over 1,300 reported dead or missing on the central Mediterranean route, while so far this year at least 6,800 people have been intercepted including 143 children and more than 800 have died or gone missing.