A migrant from South Sudan, Lam Magok Biel Ruei, who says he is a victim and witness of the abuse allegedly committed by Libyan general Osama al-Masri has filed a criminal complaint at the Rome prosecutor's office. The complaint alleges that Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Justice Minister Carlo Nordio and Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi aided and abetted the suspected war criminal, wanted by the ICC, who was first arrested in Italy in mid-January, and later sent back to Libya on an Italian plane.

The ICC allegatios against al-Masri also detail his suspected role in the abuse of migrants and control of prisons in parts of Libya. In those prisons, migrants, and numerous human rights organizations have provided accounts of violence, sometimes torture and extortion carried out against migrants as part of a wider system where migrants are sometimes repeatedly imprisoned before being allowed to continue on their journeys across the Mediterranean.

"The Italian government has made me a victim for a second time [of] these atrocities I have witnessed," claimed Lam Magok, who filed the complaint on Monday (February 3).

Biel Ruei claims that Nordio, Piantedosi and Meloni "helped the Libyan torturer evade justice." The complaint, presented with the support of migrants' rights organization Baobab Experience, was drafted by attorney Francesco Romeo. News of his denunciation was posted on the organization Baobab Experience's Facebook page.

Last month, attorney Luigi Li Gotti also filed a criminal complaint against Meloni, Nordio, Piantedosi and a cabinet secretary with the intelligence brief Alfredo Mantovano over the January 21 release and flight back to Libya of al-Masri, after he was arrested two days earlier in Turin on an International Criminal Court arrest warrant.

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Complaint denounces 'inertia of justice minister'

Lam Magok on Monday (February 3) presented a nine-page document to magistrates, with a series of enclosed files in which he talks about his case, accusing the premier and the justice and interior ministers of "aiding and abetting" the Libyan official.

According to Magok, the cabinet "jeopardized the possibility" of him obtaining "justice" as well as an opportunitiy for all those who had "also survived his violence, as well as those whom he killed and those who will continue to be abused directly by him or those under his command."

The complaint is set to be examined by the State Attorney's Office in Rome, and denounced the "inertia of the justice minister, who could and should have requested the pre-trial arrest of the criminal wanted by the International Criminal Court -- and the expulsion decree signed by the interior minister, with the immediate provision of a state flight to take the wanted man back to Libya, which allowed al-Masri to escape arrest and return with impunity to his country of origin, preventing a trial against him."

The lawyer of the alleged victim, who is currently staying at a facility in Rome run by the organization Baobab Experience, spoke about "the existence of an official statement from the International Criminal Court from January 22, 2025 which he claimed demontrates that Italian authorities were not only appropriately informed that the arrest warrant had been issued, but also involved in previous preventive consultations and coordination aimed at ensuring they would receive the court's request and implement it."

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'Italian authorities asked ICC not to comment on arrest'

The same statement, said the attorney, "reported that Italian authorities had expressly asked the International Criminal Court not to publicly comment on al-Masri's arrest, therefore showing they were aware of it."

The suspect in question has been named by the International Criminal Court (ICC) as Libyan police chief al-Masri. He was director of Tripoli's notorious Mitiga detention center, which also held migrants, and is wanted by the ICC for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder, torture, rape and sexual violence, allegedly committed in Libya from February 2015 onwards.

The Italian government said they had to free him and fly him back to Libya due to a technical issue related to his case. Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi reportedly added that he was expelled from Italy because he is a dangerous man.

The first complaint against the premier and other government officials over al-Masri's release has been sent to the Tribunal of Ministers, which will need to decide whether the case needs to be shelved or pursued.

Meanwhile on Monday evening, prosecutors in Perugia, who have jurisdiction over cases concerning magistrates in Rome, were reported to have opened an investigation, without formulating a charge or identifying those under investigation, following a criminal complaint filed by attorney Luigi Mele against Rome's Chief Prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi, who last week notified Meloni and the other government officials that a complaint had been filed against them in connection to the al-Masri case, and the attorney who filed the complaint to Rome's State Attorney's Office Luigi Li Gotti.

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Government says it wasn't pressured to release suspect

On Wednesday, Piantedosi dismissed talk of the government being blackmailed into releasing Libyan general Osama al-Masri last month.

The official's release due to a technical issue with his case, sparked an outcry and led the ICC to request clarification.

Italy has an agreement with Libya to provide aid for its coast guard in exchange for cooperation on combatting illegal migration crossings. It has led negotiations between the EU and Libya for years.

Government critics say al-Masri is central to those operations."I deny, in the most categorical manner, that, in the hours in which the matter was handled, the government received any act or communication that could be, even remotely, considered a form of undue pressure assimilated to a threat or blackmail by anyone, as has been alleged in some moments of the public debate over the last few days," Piantedosi told the Lower House as he and Justice Minister Carlo Nordio reported to parliament on the case.

"On the contrary, as always, every decision taken, was taken purely on the basis of evaluations made on facts and situations with the exclusive perspective of protecting the interests of our country."