Abducted Libyan Olympic chief freed

TRIPOLI, Libya - The Associated Press

Libyan protesters hold the portrait of Nabil al-Taher al-Alam during a sit-in in Tripoli after the Libyan Olympic Committee President was kidnapped last week. AFP photo

The president of Libya’s Olympic Committee said hours after he returned home on July 22 that his kidnapping remains a mystery but that authorities promised to investigate the case.

Committee chief Ahmed Nabil al-Taher al-Alam was released unharmed a week after unknown gunmen abducted him from his car in the capital.

“It will be become clearer in the coming days. They raised no issue and they made no requests,” he said. Al-Alam said his kidnappers posed as officials when they took him near his office on Tripoli. They later released him in Misrata, and rebels helped bring him back to Tripoli in coordination with security officials.“It is a mystery. A probe is promised and may this be a good omen to end these kidnappings,” he said. 

The abduction comes during a wave of score-settling among rival groups left over from Libya’s eight-month civil war that ended with the capture and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in October.

Dozens of former rebel groups now operate independently. Since Gadhafi’s fall, militias frequently have taken matters into their own hands and rounded up officials with ties to the ousted regime.