PROFILE MUTASSIM GADAFY:TO GET SOME sense of the workings of Mutassim Gadafy's mind, his heavily fortified former compound in Tripoli's affluent Ben Ashour neighbourhood is a good place to start.
At first glance the sprawling grounds, ringed by high walls and containing numerous low buildings, including a gym, spa, bar and guest house set among manicured lawns, appear to be what you might expect from the man often described as Muammar Gadafy’s playboy son.
But a knot of bushes in the centre conceals the entrance to a vast complex built deep underground. Down a flight of stairs and off a corridor painted green and white lies a warren of rooms and tunnels connected by reinforced metal doors about 25cm thick. Magazines including Hello!and Voguelitter the floors. A Gucci loafer lies discarded in one room, next to books on military tactics and brochures for properties in the south of France. The dozens of rooms include several stuffed with leather sofas, bedrooms lined with bunk beds, a huge industrial kitchen, a fully equipped hospital and a control room that looks like something out of a Hollywood movie. "What kind of paranoid person will build something like this – and why?" asked the scruffy revolutionary fighter who showed me around in August. "Did he think he was James Bond?"
Today the precise whereabouts of Mutassim Gadafy, fourth son of the deposed Libyan leader, are mired in confusion. Revolutionary officials have backtracked on announcements earlier this week that he had been captured in the midst of fierce fighting in Gadafy’s hometown of Sirte, one of the last holdouts of the regime diehards. Reporters were initially briefed that he was caught trying to escape the city after a four-hour gun battle. They were told the gangly Mutassim had cut his hair, which he had usually worn long, and was travelling with a family in a bid to outsmart his pursuers.
The news of Mutassim’s apparent capture prompted wild celebrations in Tripoli and other towns, including Misrata, now referred to by revolutionaries as Libya’s Stalingrad after it withstood a devastating months-long siege. But as yet there is no proof that he has been apprehended. Claims by revolutionary officials that particular regime figures have been detained or killed have often proved untrue. Soon after Tripoli fell in August, the ex-rebels said they were holding Mutassim’s older brother Saif – widely viewed as their father’s likely successor – only to have him reappear free and gloating the following day.
Saif remains at large.
BORN IN 1975, Mutassim has had a sometimes turbulent relationship with his father. A career soldier, he was forced to flee to Egypt after he was accused of conspiring to stage a coup, but was pardoned in 2005 and welcomed back into the Gadafy fold. In 2007 his father promoted him to head Libya’s national-security council. In that role, he often represented Libya in its rapprochement with the West, attending negotiations on security and counterterrorism and meeting US secretary of state Hillary Clinton in Washington in 2009.
In recent years, Mutassim was increasingly viewed as a rival to Saif for the succession, as noted in a 2009 US diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks. The memo describes him as “not intellectually curious”. It adds: “He does not appear to have the depth of knowledge and analytical ability commensurate with his position but at the same time, seems to be slowly growing into the job . . . Nevertheless, he is considered a serious contender to succeed his father and has proven he has the power to influence military and security decisions.”
Mutassim also had an uneasy relationship with his younger brother, Khamis, who headed the much-feared brigade that carried his name. Khamis reportedly took advantage of Mutassim’s years of exile in Egypt to take control of many of his sibling’s businesses. In 2008, Mutassim requested $1.2 billion (€870 million) from Libya’s National Oil Corporation to help him establish a militia similar to that led by Khamis.
Mutassim was said to have the support of the regime’s more conservative elements, who bristled at Saif’s approaches to the West. But that backing was tested in recent years as word of his high living and personal excesses trickled out through diplomatic dispatches and other sources. Tales of womanising and lavish parties abounded. These included a New Year bash on the Caribbean island of St Barts, where Mutassim and his entourage were entertained by performers including Beyoncé, Usher, Mariah Carey and Jay-Z. (Some time after the party, the singers donated their fees to charity.) His hedonistic lifestyle was recently outlined by a former girlfriend, a Dutch glamour model named Talitha van Zon.
In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph’s Nick Meo, she recalled how he would fly his large retinue around the world in his private Boeing to attend events such as the Grand Prix in Monaco or to party in exotic destinations. When Mutassim travelled to Paris or London, he would book several floors of the most expensive hotels, and fly in celebrity hairdressers from Italy, at €5,000 a time.
“I asked him once how much he spent, and he took a minute to add it up in his head,” van Zon recalled. “He said, ‘About $2 million.’ I said, ‘You mean a year?’ He said, ‘No, a month.’ ”
Van Zon also provided glimpses of Mutassim’s lust for power, inspired by his father’s example. “He worshipped his father,” she said. “He talked a lot about Hitler, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez. He liked leaders who had a lot of power. He always said, ‘I want to do better than my father.’ ”
Her last sighting of Mutassim, just days before his father’s forces were routed from Tripoli, had disturbed her. “He had changed . . . He had a beard, he was sitting on a couch strewn with automatic weapons and he was guarded by unsmiling 16-year-old boys with sub-machine guns.” Mutassim boasted to her that he would lead his father’s regime to victory over what he called “rats”.
“He said that in countries like Libya you have to do it a bit harder, otherwise they don’t listen. There was no fear that the regime was going to lose. I think he was a little bit in denial,” van Zon remembered. “His eyes were cold. He looked capable of killing someone, and he hadn’t looked like that before. I asked myself, not for the first time; what the hell am I doing in Libya?”
Curriculum vitae
Who is he? Petulant 36-year-old son of Muammar. Career army officer.
Why is he in the news?There were conflicting reports this week that he had been captured during fierce fighting in his father's hometown of Sirte.
Most likely to say"When we've wiped out the rats" – the term he and his father use to describe Libya's revolutionaries – "we'll party in St Barts."
Least likely to sayDaddy's Green Book is a load of tosh.
