ROME: Italy’s government said Thursday a Libyan police chief arrested on a war crimes warrant was flown home after a court found no basis to detain him — and he was too dangerous to remain.
Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi defended before parliament the release on Tuesday of Osama Najim, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity charges related to his management of migrant detention camps.
Najim was arrested in the northern city of Turin on Sunday but returned to Tripoli Tuesday on an Italian air force plane after the court of appeals in Rome ruled that he could not be held.
Piantedosi told the Senate that the court had found the detention of Najim was “irregular” and “not provided for by law,” ordering him freed.
Najim was “then repatriated to Tripoli for urgent security reasons,” the minister said, citing “the dangerousness of the subject.”
Najim is believed to have been in charge of Tripoli’s Mitiga detention center, and is wanted on charges including murder, rape and sexual violence and torture, committed since 2015.
Italy’s release of the Libyan has drawn vehement criticism from opposition parties and a subtle rebuke from the ICC, which on Wednesday reminded its member state that it had a “duty” to “cooperate fully” in the court’s investigations and prosecutions.
It said Najim had been released and sent home “without prior notice or consultation with the court.”
In its order Tuesday to release Najim, the Rome appeals court wrote that the arrest did not conform to Italian law because ICC requests should first pass through the justice minister, who, “to date, has sent no request on the matter.”
Italian opposition parties have demanded that Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni explain before parliament the reasons for the release of an accused war criminal wanted by the international court.
On Thursday, Sandra Zampa, a senator with the center-left Democratic party, called the affair “shameful.”
“He was not simply released from prison, but he was brought home on a state plane,” Zampa said, charging that “procedural errors have nothing to do with it.”
International human rights groups have long condemned abuses in Libyan detention centers, citing widespread violence and torture.
Rome has a controversial deal with the North African country — dating from 2017 and renewed under Meloni’s hard-right government — to provide funding and training to the Libyan coast guard.
In exchange, Libya was expected to help stem the departure of migrants to Italy or return those already at sea back to Libya, where they were often taken to such detention centers.
In 2011, the United Nations referred the situation in Libya to the ICC for investigation, a few months before a revolt toppled dictator Muammar Qaddafi after four decades of iron-fisted rule.
Najim’s arrest and release come about a week after Rome and Tripoli resumed direct flights between the two capitals after a decade-long hiatus.
Italy’s foreign ministry hailed the “concerted effort” shown by Rome to strengthen ties with its former colony, calling Libya “a strategic and privileged partner for our country.”

LONDON: Digital transformation, while crucial, is insufficient for driving true modernization in governance, Maryam Al Hammadi, the UAE’s minister of state and secretary-general of the UAE Cabinet, told attendees at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday.

Speaking on a panel titled “Governments Rewired,” Al Hammadi emphasized that digital initiatives must be paired with sweeping regulatory reforms to ensure nations remain competitive and appealing to global talent.

She said: “We need to attract talents, we need to attract entrepreneurs, so we need them to be living in the UAE.

“It’s not about attracting them alone, but actually to make them live in the UAE. And that’s why we have to do massive reform in our regulations, in all aspects.”

Al Hammadi cited the UAE’s introduction of specialized courts operating in English as an example of such reforms. She argued that without updating regulatory frameworks, countries risked widening bureaucratic gaps as technology and industries evolved, discouraging both investment and talent retention.

She added: “In four years, 80 percent of the federal laws in the UAE have been changed, more than 40 laws in the UAE have been rebuilt and 30 new laws introduced.” She said that 99 percent of government services had been digitally transformed.

Al Hammadi highlighted that the rapid pace of technological advance had significantly elevated expectations, making modernization not a “luxury” but a “necessity” for governments to remain relevant, competitive, and effective.

Artificial intelligence and its potential to bridge global divides dominated discussions both on and off the forum’s panels. While many speakers championed AI’s ability to foster development, concerns about growing protectionism and restricted access to the technology persisted.

Achim Steiner, administrator of the UN Development Programme, highlighted the importance of adopting a decentralized and agile approach to AI governance.

He said: “What I sometimes find intriguing is that the AI narrative of Davos is sometimes somewhat removed from the narrative that I hear in the rest of the world.”

He pointed out that much of AI’s foundational research had been publicly funded, emphasizing the role of governments in shaping AI’s trajectory.

“We often pretend that all of this is just a commercial and business value proposition. Actually, much of the fundamental research is publicly funded,” Steiner said, stressing the critical role of governments in fostering innovation.

He further argued that while fundamental research helped to lay the groundwork, the real challenge was at the other end — how these applications could drive entirely new economic trajectories, create markets, and establish platforms.

Steiner stressed the importance of governments striking a balance between being “enablers and regulators” in this process, adding: “Society leads technology, and not always technology leads society.”

Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair said that while technological advance presented a concrete opportunity to “transform,” how “government understands, masters and harnesses the technology revolution is the single biggest thing for government to get its head around today.”

He added: “This is the challenge, both for the developed world and the developing world.”