Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh has allegedly asked Foreign Minister Najla Mangoush to communicate with the Libyan embassy in Washington to file a complaint against Libyan army commander Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar whom Dbeibeh accused of forging a document, a leaked memo shows.
Libyan newspaper Al-Marsad said it obtained a copy of a defense ministry memo, which it claimed was written by Dbeibeh. The alleged memo references a document submitted by Haftar’s attorney Lindsay R. McKasson as part of his defense case in the lawsuit against him before U.S. court.
Dbeibeh allegedly says in the memo that Haftar’s attorney has falsely claimed that this particular document was issued by the Libyan defense ministry, which the premier also runs as the acting defense minister.
In the memo, Dbeibeh denies the issuance of this document by the defense ministry and cited a number of reasons for his disclaimer including the mismatching of signatures, seals and dates between the document and those of the defense ministry’s.
Dbeibeh allegedly denounced the forged document as a “willful slander in order to mislead justice” which is “a crime punishable by Libyan and American law”.
The prime minister allegedly urged Mangoush to address this issue with the Libyan embassy in the U.S. and file a complaint against Haftar before the American judiciary.