Ambassador’s captors demand release of Libyan jailed in Jordan

Libya's foreign ministry's spokesman Said al-Aswad says several masked gunmen in civilian clothes and in two cars attacked the car of Ambassador Fawaz Al Etan on Tuesday morning in Tripoli.

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TRIPOLI // The kidnappers of Jordan’s ambassador in Tripoli on Monday demanded the release of a Libyan who is serving a life prison sentence in Jordan, a security source said.

Essam Baitelmel, a member of the Libyan team investigating the abduction, said they had demanded the release of Mohamed Dersi and said the diplomat was not harmed and in good health.

Mr Baitelmel said they still do not know the identity of the kidnappers, who had called on the ambassador’s phone, which he had left in his car.

Masked gunmen abducted the Jordanian ambassador in the Libyan capital on Tuesday, officials said, the latest in a wave of abductions in the North African nation still plagued by lawlessness more than two years after the removal of dictator Muammar Qaddafi.

* Reuters and Associated Press