Opinion: Why Have We Forgotten About Libya?

All civilians deserve protection, but some civilians deserve more protection than others. Or so it seems in Libya today.

Two years ago, the U.N. Security Council authorized a military operation by NATO with a mandate to protect civilians who were under attack by Moammar Gadhafi's forces. That operation led to Gadhafi's fall.

Today, long after the fighting has stopped, those who are rightly or wrongly perceived to have supported Gadhafi are under threat. Thousands of women and children have been displaced from their homes and living in camps, often harassed. Men have been detained, tortured and killed. They need protection, but the nations that intervened two years ago have done virtually nothing on their behalf.The most pressing case involves the former residents of the town of Tawergha, which had a pre-war population of about 42,000.

Tawerghans formerly enjoyed Gadhafi's financial and political support, and the town became a military staging ground during the 2011 war. Many fighting age men from Tawergha joined Gadhafi's fight.Some of these men allegedly committed atrocities during the war in the nearby city of Misrata, which suffered from a brutal, two month siege in which hundreds of civilians died. Misratans say that Tawerghan fighters committed killings and rapes in their city and that now it is time to take revenge.

And revenge is what the anti-Gadhafi militias of Misrata have been taking, forcing all Tawerghans from their town. Spread across Libya, Tawerghans have been hunted down, detained, tortured and killed. Satellite imagery analyzed by Human Rights Watch corroborates what we saw on the ground: the systematic destruction of the town's residential, commercial and industrial structures after the fighting had stopped in an apparent attempt to prevent returns.

The Misratans demand justice for the crimes committed against them, and this is their due. But justice is not served by punishing an entire community for crimes committed by some of its members - that is collective punishment.But while the U.N. Security Council and its powerful members jumped to protect Libyan civilians when Gadhafi was the enemy, they have not taken serious action against the revenge attacks that Tawerghans and other displaced communities in Libya are suffering from today - about 60,000 people in all, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

NO MERCY: Saudi Arabia executes 7 for juvenile crime despite UN appeal

Saudi Arabia has publicly executed seven men convicted of an armed robbery they committed as minors. The execution was carried out despite a UN appeal for clemency.
The men were executed by a firing squad "as a punishment to them and to deter others" from carrying out similar crimes, the Saudi interior ministry said.

In 2009, the seven were convicted of "forming a gang that carried out several armed robberies and thefts with the help of other people" in 2005 – when they were less than 18 years of age – and sentenced to death.The execution was "implemented a while ago at a public square in Abha," where the defendants were "shot dead," not beheaded as is customary for executions in the kingdom, a witness said.

The men were to be executed a week ago, on March 5, but Saudi King Abdullah’s eldest son reportedly ordered a one-month postponement, promising new investigation.The case came into the spotlight after one of the convicts managed to contact a reporter and claimed he was tortured and threatened into confessing.

Numerous human rights groups have appealed to Saudi Arabia to halt their sentences and review the case. Amnesty International called the execution “sheer brutality.”

The executions came a day after the UN again urged the kingdom to halt its plans to kill the seven, alleging they did not receive a fair trial.

"In countries that have not abolished the death penalty, capital punishment may be imposed only following a trial that complied with fair trial and due process safeguards," said Christof Heyns, the United Nations' special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.

Armed robbery is punishable by death in Saudi Arabia, along with rape, murder and drug trafficking.The latest executions bring the total number of those killed by the death penalty in Saudi Arabia this year to 26. According to various estimates, the country executed 69 to 76 people in 2012.