Ahmed Jadallah / Reuters, file

Khamis Gaddafi is shown in a photograph found at Fatih University in June 2011.

Khamis Gadhafi, youngest son of slain Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, was reported dead Saturday, exactly a year after his father died.

There were conflicting reports about whether Khamis Gadhafi was captured alive but gravely wounded after a gunbattle in Bani Walid, a pro-Gadhafi stronghold where fighting has raged for three days. And Khamis Gadhafi has been reported killed several times, including in an August 2011 NATO airstrike.

Al Arabiya news agency reported that sources told it Khamis Gadhafi was severely wounded and arrested but that he later died. However, Al Arabiya also said, Mohamed al-Magarief, the head of Libya’s democratically elected General National Congress, told the agency the late dictator's son was killed during the clashes.

A Libyan journalist told NBC News that Khamis Gadhafi was captured while fleeing in a convoy. His right leg had been amputated, but it was not clear if that was a result of recent fighting or a previous injury.

Dr. Mustafa Abushagur, sacked as Libya’s prime minister last week, tweeted Saturday that Khamis Gadhafi’s body was taken to a Misrata hospital, the Russian Times reported.

The Guardian of London reported that a statement by the Libyan national congress spokesman, Omar Hamdan, said the 28-year-old was killed "in battle" but gave no further details.

The reports came after heavy fighting between the pro-Gadhafi garrison in Bani Walid and militias allied to the Libyan government.

The seventh son of Col. Moammar Gadhafi, Khamis Gadhafi is known as one of the most hardline of Gadhafi's sons. 

His reported death prompted wild celebrations in Misrata, Libya's third city, where fireworks and car horns filled the night, the Russian Times reported. He was reviled there for atrocities allegedly perpetrated by the 32nd Brigade, a special unit he formed after studying in a Russian military academy, the Russian Times said.

Slideshow: Conflict in Libya

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An uprising in Libya ousts dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

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Related: US slaps sanctions on woman accused of helping Saadi Gadhafi

The reports came the same day of reports that Moammar Gadhafi's chief spokesman, Moussa Ibrahim, had been captured.

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On Saturday, Magarief said not all areas of Libya had been liberated, Al Jazeera news agency reported.

"The campaign to liberate the country has not been fully completed," Magarief said on state television.

"Bani Walid's misfortune is that it has become a sanctuary for a large number of outlaws and anti-revolutionaries and mercenaries," Magarief said.

Slideshow: Moammar Gadhafi through the years

Patrick Kovarik / AFP - Getty Images

A look at the life and times of Libya's mercurial and flamboyant leader

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New evidence implicates Libyan militia in the apparent execution of dozens of detainees in the immediate wake of Moammar Gadhafi’s capture and death last year, according to Human Rights Watch.

In a 50-page report issued Wednesday, the New York-based organization said at least 66 members of Gadhafi’s convoy were captured and ‘summarily executed’ by militia based in Misrata.

By comparing mobile phone video taken by the opposition militia members with hospital morgue photographs, HRW have identified numerous detainees who were captured in Sirte and later executed at the town’s Mahari Hotel.

Slideshow: Conflict in Libya

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An uprising in Libya ousts dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

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“When we arrived, there were 53 bodies lying in the garden of the hotel. The first indication we had this was an execution site was that many victims had their hands tied behind their backs,“ said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at HRW. Volunteer workers at the scene said that relatives of additional victims had recovered their bodies prior to the Human Rights Watch visit.

"In case after case we investigated, the individuals had been videotaped alive by the opposition fighters who held them, and then found dead hours later," Bouckaert said.

HRW said these killings constitute the largest documented execution of detainees by anti-Gadhafi forces during the eight-month conflict in Libya.

One case cited by HRW is that of Ahmed Ali Yusuf al-Ghariyani, 29, a Navy recruit originally from Tawergha, a Gadhafi stronghold. In a phone video that is believed to show him in captivity, militia forces are seen to abuse and taunt him.

Al-Ghariyani’s body was later found at the Mahari Hotel and was photographed by hospital staff and buried as unidentified body number 86. He was later identified by family members from the hospital photographs.

The report also casts doubt on what HRW said is the Libyan authorities’ account of the fate of Gadhafi and his son Motassim, both of whom are officially reported to have died in cross-fire.

In video released with the report, Moammar is seen alive and bloodied in the hands of the rebels, in images similar to those widely circulated in the days after his death. 

According to the report, Motassim Gaddafi was also captured alive at the scene of the Sirte battle. He was wounded and then filmed being transported by members of a Misrata-based opposition militia to their home city. He was again filmed in a room, smoking cigarettes and drinking water. By the evening, his dead body, with a new wound on his throat that was not visible in the prior video footage, was being publicly displayed in Misrata.

Peter Brouckaert said the Libyan authorities’ refusal to accept or investigate atrocities by former rebels shows ‘a government in denial.’

“They are not in a position to confront the militia,” he said, ”It shows who’s in power in Libya.”

Calls for militias to be brought under the control of the defense or interior ministries have met resistance from some fighters.

Meanwhile, some groups have been implicated in revenge attacks and communal strife, while members of one Islamist militia have been accused of taking part in the attack on the U.S. Consulate in the eastern city Benghazi on Sept. 11 that killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.

In the aftermath of Stevens' death, popular resentment surged and thousands took to the streets of Benghazi demanding the dismantlement of the militias. The government has taken over some militia headquarters and appointed military officers to run the groups, and designated some "outlawed" and others "tolerated."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Mahmud Turkia / AFP - Getty Images

Libyan security forces inspect the remains of a vehicle near the Ministry of Interior in Tripoli after twin blasts killed two people in the Libyan capital early Sunday.

At least two people were killed when three car bombs exploded near interior ministry and security buildings in the Libyan capital on Sunday, the first lethal attack of its kind since Moammar Gadhafi’s fall last year, according to reports.

One of the victims was killed by a blast near a police academy on one of Tripoli’s main streets, Omar al-Mukhtar, regional news channel Al Arabiya reported.

The blasts took place just before dawn as worshippers prepared for mass morning prayers marking Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim celebration that marks the end of the fasting month Ramadan.

Ambulances and firefighters rushed to the scenes of the blasts and large numbers of police cordoned off the sites before starting to remove the charred vehicles, Reuters reported.

Pictures of one of the car bombs, posted on Twitter by UK-based Libya political observer Mohamed Eljarh, were taken by eyewitness Ahmed Abdulgader, Eljarh said.

The first bomb blew up near the interior ministry's administrative offices in Tripoli but caused no casualties, security sources told Reuters. On arriving at the site of the explosion, police found another car bomb that had not blown up.

Minutes later, two car bombs exploded near the former headquarters of a women's police academy, which the defense ministry has been using for interrogations and detentions, the sources said, k il ling two people, both civilians, and wounding two.

The buildings targeted by the bombers are in residential areas at the heart of the capital, Tripoli.

Sporadic violence has remained a problem in Libya despite the peaceful transfer of power to the new government after elections in July, the first in decades following the overthrow last year of Moammar Gadhafi after 42 years in power.

The International Committee of the Red Cross announced that it was suspending its activities in Benghazi, Libya's second biggest city, and Misrata after one of its compounds in Misrata was attacked with grenades and rockets.

The fate of seven Iranian relief workers, official guests of the Libyan Red Crescent Association, remains unknown almost three weeks after they were kidnapped by gunmen in the heart of Benghazi.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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A Libya anti-election protester was shot dead in the eastern town of Ajdabiya on Saturday when he tried to steal a ballot box from a polling station during the nation’s first free national poll in 60 years, officials say.

Ajdabiya has been a focus of protests against the election by eastern Libyans who say the vote designed to shake off the legacy of Moammar Gadhafi’s 40-year, one-man rule and elect a 200-member parliament is a sham and want more autonomy for their region. The east had been allotted only 60 seats in the assembly compared to 102 for the west.

An official said by telephone that the protester was killed in an exchange of fire with local people trying to prevent disruption of the election. Two people were wounded.

Elsewhere, Libyans’ joy over voting was tempered by boycott calls, the burning of ballots and attacks on eastern polling centers. The unrest exposed major fault lines in the oil-rich North African nation of 6 million people — the east-west divide and efforts by Islamists to assert power.

PhotoBlog: Libyans vote in first election in 60 years

Polls closed at 8 p.m. (2 p.m. ET) in most places, but delays in starting caused voting to go later in some cities, Al Jazeera reported. In Ajdabiya and other places where voting did not get under way until the afternoon, balloting will go as late as 7 a.m. Sunday, the Arab news agency reported.

Preliminary results are expected to be reported Sunday.

Despite troubles, overall turnout was high, the BBC reported.

Earlier: Tension as polls open in first Libyan election in 60 years

Few Libyans remember their last national vote in 1965, when no political parties were allowed, the BBC said, noting even fewer took part in their country's first parliamentary elections in February 1952, shortly after independence.

Mohammed Abed / AFP - Getty Images

Libyan protesters demanding greater representation shout slogans Saturday outside a polling station in the eastern city of Benghazi.

"I feel free at last. It's a feeling I cannot describe: Like a human being," Asmaddin Arifi told the BBC.

Voters flashed the V-for-victory sign as they entered polling centers, The Associated Press reported. Motorists honked their horns as they drove past. Others shouted "Allahu Akbar," or "God is Greater," from their car windows.

In the Mediterranean port city of Benghazi, cradle of the Libyan revolution, pro-autonomy activists Saturday seized electoral papers and ballot boxes. A BBC Arabic reporter said security forces did not intervene.

Libyan election worker killed in chopper crash day ahead of balloting

A day earlier outside Benghazi, gunfire struck a helicopter and killed an election commission worker aboard the flight that was carrying voting materials.

Armed men stopped voters casting their ballots in the port town of Ras Lanuf, the BBC reported.

But Nuri al-Abbar, the head of the election commission, told the BBC that 94 percent of polling stations across the country had opened normally.

The four major contenders in the Libyan race range from the Muslim Brotherhood-linked party and another Islamist coalition on one end of the spectrum to a secular-minded party led by a Western-educated former rebel prime minister on the other.

Despite the divisions and unrest, the prevailing mood was one of triumph.

"We are celebrating today and we want the whole world to celebrate with us," Prime Minister Abdurrahim el-Keib said after he cast his ballot in Tripoli.

This article includes reporting by Reuters and The Associated Press.

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TRIPOLI/BENGHAZI, Libya -- Libyans began voting in their first free national election in 60 years on Saturday, a poll designed to shake off the legacy of Moammar Gadhafi but which risks being hijacked by autonomy demands in the east and unrest in the desert south.

Voters will choose a 200-member assembly which will elect a prime minister and cabinet before laying the ground for full parliamentary elections next year under a new constitution.

Candidates with Islamic agendas dominate the field of more than 3,700 hopefuls, suggesting Libya will be the next "Arab Spring" country after Egypt and Tunisia to see religious parties secure footholds in power after last year's uprisings.

But the credibility of the vote will be wrecked if armed militia with regional or tribal loyalties discourage voters from turning out, or if disputes over the outcome degenerate into pitched battles between rival factions.

Libyan election worker killed in chopper crash day ahead of balloting

In the oil-rich east, where there is a thriving autonomy movement, calls for a boycott and pre-election violence have cast a shadow over the vote. But in Tripoli, voters were jubilant.

Libyans flashed the "V" for victory sign as they entered the polling centers. Motorists honked their horns as they drove past to greet the voters lined outside. Others shouted "Allahu Akbar," or "God is Greater," from their car windows.

The election lines brought together Libya's women, men, youth and children accompanying their parents. There were women in black abayas, or black robes, bearded men, elderly men and women on wheelchairs or using canes to support themselves. Some voters arrived at polling centers with the Libyan red, green and black flags wrapped around their shoulders.

"Look at the lines. Everyone came of his and her own free will. I knew that day would come and Gadhafi would not be there forever," said Riyadh Al-Alagy, a 50-year-old civil servant in Tripoli. "He left us a nation with a distorted mind, a police state with no institutions. We want to start from zero," he said, as a woman came out of the polling center ululating and flashing the purple ink on one of her fingers. The ink is used to prevent multiple voting. 

Slideshow: Conflict in Libya

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An uprising in Libya ousts dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

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Inside a school being used as a polling station in central Tripoli, a few dozen women lined up. Some carried the new Libyan flag on their backs or wore jewelry in its red, green and black colors. Some had tears in their eyes.

"I am a Libyan citizen in free Libya," said Mahmud Mohammed Al-Bizamti, outside the polling station.

"I came today to be able to vote in a democratic way. Today is like a wedding for us," he said.

Civil war a possibility
The greatest threat comes from the eastern region around the city of Benghazi, cradle of the NATO-backed uprising that ousted Gadhafi nearly a year ago but which complains of neglect by the interim government in Tripoli in the west.

"There is no doubt there could be a civil war between us in the east and the west," Hamed al-Hassi, a former rebel who now heads the High Military Council of Cyrenaica, the name of the eastern region, told Reuters.

"The country will be in a state of paralysis because no one in the government is listening to us," said Hassi, whose group is charged with securing the east but has fallen out with the government over representation.

On Friday, local armed groups shut off half the North African country's oil exports to press their demands for greater representation in the new national assembly. At least three major oil exporting terminals were affected.

"The strikes will continue for 48 hours if the government does not respond positively to their requests," said a note to oil companies from shipping agents.

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered in a square in central Benghazi late on Friday, saying they would boycott the vote in protest at the fact that the east had been allotted only 60 seats in the assembly compared to 102 for the west.

In the latest attack on election authorities in the east, a helicopter carrying voting material had to make an emergency landing near Benghazi on Friday after being struck by anti-aircraft fire. One person on board was killed.

Could sun-soaked Libya be the Mediterranean's next tourism hot spot?

"There is no security in this country," complained Emad El-Sayih, deputy head of the High National Election Commission.

Concerns exist elsewhere. In the isolated southern area of Kufra in the Saharan desert, tribal clashes are so fierce that election observers will be unable to visit, and some question whether the vote can proceed in certain areas there.

'First things first'
In Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte, a former fishing village on the southern rim of the Mediterranean Sea, the mood ahead of the polls was restrained, with some saying they would not vote.

"They should take care of us first, look at our homes," said Abed Mohammed, a resident of District Two neighborhood which saw some of the heaviest fighting and where Gadhafi was believed to have hidden before being captured and killed.

Slideshow: Moammar Gadhafi through the years

Patrick Kovarik / AFP - Getty Images

A look at the life and times of Libya's mercurial and flamboyant leader.

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"We are not against elections in the future, but first things first," he said.

Yet many Libyans are eager for a first taste of democracy and will be heading enthusiastically to the polls.

While analysts say it is hard to predict the political make-up of the new assembly, parties and candidates professing an attachment to Islamic values dominate and very few are running on an exclusively secular ticket.

The Justice and Construction offshoot of Libya's Muslim Brotherhood is tipped to do well, as is al-Watan, the party of former CIA detainee and Islamist insurgent Abdel Hakim Belhadj.

Libya begins battle to seize $20B in Gadhafi assets -- starting with London mansion

Parity rules for the new assembly mean there are many female candidates. Yet many of their campaign posters in Tripoli have been defaced, underlining the ambivalence felt by some in Libyan society about a greater female role in politics.

"Politics is a new field for men and women in Libya," said Lamia Busidra, 38, a leading candidate for the al-Wattan party in Benghazi. "The qualifications are there, women can do it, they just need the confidence in themselves to do it."

Early partial results after polls close at 8 p.m. (12 p.m. ET) on Saturday will give some guide to the make-up of the assembly but full preliminary results are not due until Monday.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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BENGHAZI, Libya -- Gunfire killed a Libyan election commission worker riding in a helicopter Friday, officials said.

The helicopter carrying ballots for Saturday's election made a forced landing at Benina International Airport outside the eastern town of Benghazi, an official said.

It was the latest attempt to derail elections in a region where many seek more autonomy and argue they will be under-represented in a new 200-member congress that will name a prime minister and pave the way for full parliamentary polls next year.

"We were preparing to receive the voting material as it arrived on a helicopter from Tripoli but it was hit and one man died," Ahmed Abdelmalik, an employee at an election commission branch told Reuters.

Hamed Al-Hassi, head of the military council for the Cyrenaica region, confirmed the incident but said the identity of the attackers was not immediately known.

Manu Brabo / AP

A Libyan election official works at a polling station Friday in Tripoli.

"A helicopter carrying ballots and flying over the region of Hawari (south of Benghazi) was struck by small arms fire," army spokesman Colonel Ali al-Sheikhi told Agence France Presse.

Earlier protests by groups seeking greater autonomy in the east forced the closure of three ports, shutting down around half of Libya's oil exporting capacity.

On Thursday, the main storage center for election materials in the eastern town of Ajdabiya was badly damaged in a suspected arson attack.

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The elections are Libya's first free national vote in over half a century and come barely a year after the ousting of Moammar Gadhafi by a NATO-backed uprising. Regional and tribal loyalties suppressed under Gadhafi have since come to the fore.

"We expected this issue," Emad El-Sayih, deputy head of Libya's High National Election Commission (HNEC), told Reuters.

"There is no security in this country -- the interior ministry and the army are incapable of protecting the elections. The (election) commission is in a state of depression."

Several East Libya groups want the country's interim rulers to review the allocation of seats in the General National Congress. The  system allocates 100 seats to the west, including Tripoli, 60 to the oil-rich east and 40 to the sparsely settled south. Advocates of federalism are demanding an equal distribution of seats among Libya's regions.

The National Transitional Council has led rebels during the eight-month war and held power in its aftermath.

This article includes reporting by Reuters and The Associated Press.

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BRUSSELS - NATO air strikes killed 72 civilians in Libya last year, Human Rights Watch said on Monday, accusing the western alliance of failing to acknowledge the scope of collateral damage it caused during the campaign that helped oust Moammar Gadhafi.

In a report based on investigations at bombing sites during and after the conflict, the New York-based HRW said NATO strikes killed 20 women and 24 children. It called on the alliance to compensate civilian victims and investigate attacks that may have been unlawful.

"Attacks are allowed only on military targets, and serious questions remain in some incidents about what exactly NATO forces were striking," Fred Abrahams, special adviser at HRW, said in a statement.

The report claims to be the most extensive investigation to date of civilian casualties from NATO's air campaign and presents a higher death toll estimate than a March paper by Amnesty International which documented 55 civilian deaths, including 16 children and 14 women.

NATO considers its Libya operation highly successful, illustrating the allies' ability to work well together in a limited campaign. NATO carried out some 26,000 sorties including some 9,600 strike missions and destroyed about 5,900 targets before operations ended on October 31.

The alliance said the campaign had been conducted with "unprecedented care and precision and to a standard exceeding that required by international humanitarian law".

"NATO did everything possible to minimize risks to civilians, but in a complex military campaign, that risk can never be zero," said NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu in a statement.

"We deeply regret any instance of civilian casualties for which NATO may have been responsible."

NATO: Gadhafi using mosques, children's parks as shields

HRW acknowledged that NATO had taken care to minimize civilian casualties and added that countries such as Russia that had made claims of large-scale civilian deaths did so "to score political points".

But Abrahams, principal author of the report, said the care NATO took during the campaign was "undermined by its refusal to examine the dozens of civilian deaths."

Concerns about civilian deaths in Libya could hamper NATO's ability to carry out future operations outside the territory of its members, in North America and Europe.

Although Russia co-sponsored the U.N. resolution authorizing intervention in Libya, it later said NATO had "grossly violated" its mandate. This was a factor earlier this year when Russia opposed a U.N. resolution calling for action to stop the violence in Syria.

HRW highlighted an attack on the village of Majer, 160 km (100 miles) east of Tripoli on August 8, when NATO air strikes on two family compounds killed 34 civilians and wounded more than 30.

HRW said NATO had told it that the Majer compounds were a "staging base and military accommodation" for Gaddafi forces, but had not provided specific information to support that claim.

"During four visits to Majer, including one the day after the attack, the only possible evidence of a military presence found by Human Rights Watch was a single military-style shirt - common clothing for many Libyans - in the rubble of one of the three destroyed houses," it said.

NATO said it had now looked into each credible allegation of harm to civilians and confirmed that the targets struck "were legitimate military targets, selected in a manner consistent with the U.N. mandate". 

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Abdel Magid Al-fergany / AP, file

Abdullah al-Senoussi, right, whispers to Moammar Gadhafi in 2009.

Updated at 9:18 a.m. ET: NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania -- Mauritanian security officials arrested former Libyan intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senoussi on Saturday, the country's official information agency and Libyan officials said. He is sought by the International Criminal Court.

The official communique said al-Senoussi was arrested at the airport in the capital of the West African nation. It said he was coming from Morocco and was carrying a fake Malian passport.

Libyan government spokesman Nasser al-Manee confirmed the news.

"He was arrested this morning in Nouakchott airport and there was a young man with him. We think it is his son," he said.

The ICC indicted al-Senoussi and Gadhafi's son for crimes against humanity, including multiple murders, allegedly committed during the former regime's crackdown on dissent.

Al-Manee said Libya was seeking al-Senussi's extradition.

"Today the prosecutor general has sent an extradition request to the Mauritanian government through Interpol, who delivered this request to the Mauritanian government," he told a news conference.

"The Libyan foreign ministry is in touch with Mauritania about the procedure. The Libyan government is ready to receive Abdullah al-Senussi ... and give him a fair trial in Libya."

This is a breaking news story. Please check again for more details.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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Alastair Jamieson, msnbc.com

This $16 million house in the Hampstead area of London was bought by Moammar Gadhafi's playboy son Saadi about six months before the Arab Spring uprisings began.

LONDON -- With nine bedrooms, a stylish indoor pool and a suede-walled private movie theater, it was a standout luxury home -- even in a London neighborhood already full of celebrities and super-rich foreign oligarchs.

But after being wrecked by squatters, 7 Winnington Close is now at the center an international court battle over the multi-billion dollar assets of dead Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

The $16 million property, in north London’s wealthy Hampstead area, was bought by the despot's playboy son Saadi about six months before the Arab Spring uprisings began.

Now that the Gadhafi regime has been swept away, Libya's new government wants ownership of the home, alleging it was purchased with cash plundered illegally from the state and its citizens.

The country's new rulers will ask Britain's High Court on Friday for the repatriation of the property as the proceeds of corruption.

Lawyer Mohamed Shaban will argue that Saadi, a former professional soccer player who is now living under house arrest in Niger, could not possibly have afforded the mansion on his wages as a commander in the Libyan army and therefore must have purchased it with state funds.

Glentree Estates

This file photo provided by a real estate agent shows a bedroom in the London home belonging to Saadi Gadhafi.

Fast cars
It is significant development – the first international move to recover parts of the vast Gadhafi family portfolio of property, hedge funds, fast cars and private jets.

"If we are successful, we will then start to build a case for the other assets," Giuma Bukleb, media attaché to the Libyan Embassy in London, told msnbc.com.

The court case will also signal the end of a year-long occupation of the house by squatters.

A group calling itself "Topple The Tyrants" took over the house during the uprising, demanding that it be returned to its "rightful owners," the Libyan people.

The squatters unfurled a banner on the roof that read, "Out of Libya, Out of London" and "Solidarity," and posted a notice on the door declaring the building occupied – a move that under British law prevents owners from using force to access to their own property without the backing of court bailiffs.

One Libyan law student who took part in the occupation told the London Evening Standard the mansion had been "pretty much destroyed" inside, adding: "There's no furniture, just mattresses. The swimming pool is smashed and the heating doesn't work."

Alastair Jamieson, msnbc.com

A notice posted at the door of Saadi Gadhafi's house in Hampstead, London.

When msnbc.com visited the house this week there was no answer at the door. A black leather couch had been pushed up against the side entrance to prevent access.

'Peace and quiet'
The occupation has bemused neighbors, whose quiet cul-de-sac is now regularly besieged by reporters and Libyan political activists.

"It was noisy at the start but we haven’t heard anything for a while," said one neighbor, who declined to be named. "I hope the court action is successful so that Libyans get their property and we get our peace and quiet."

Mahmud Turkia / AFP - Getty Images, file

Saadi Gadhafi is a former professional soccer player. He is under house arrest in Niger.

Robert Palmer, a campaigner for anti-corruption group Global Witness, said Friday's court case would be "hugely significant."

"This is the first action to recover the British assets of an Arab Spring dictator," he said. "A lot of people will be watching to see what happens."

$20 billion in assets?
Bukleb said much of the Gadhafi family's property is in London, where one of the dictator's sons, Seif, attended the London School of Economics.

Dealings with Gadhafi son embarrass London college

Libyan Embassy officials say a court victory will trigger a deeper investigation into the Gadhafi family's complex network of assets, which Britain's Treasury estimates could be worth almost $20 billion in total.

Alastair Jamieson

A discarded sofa blocks entry to Saadi Gadhafi's home in Hampstead, London.

Many are owned through offshore investment companies. The house at the center of Friday's case is registered to Capitana Seas Ltd., a company based in the British Virgin Islands. The embassy's lawyers were forced to seek the U.K. Treasury's intervention in order to establish a link to Saadi Gadhafi, who is thought to be one of the company's directors.

Embassy officials believe the family's U.K. property assets include the $200 million Portman House on Oxford Street and apartments worth a total of $25 million in South Kensington.

"The fact is, we simply do not know for certain exactly how much the Gadhafi family had in London," Bukleb said.

A year after revolt, Libya mired in factional fighting

The National Transitional Council (NTC) won United Nations approval to access $1.55 billion in Libyan currency held in the U.K. by printer De La Rue last year.

Slideshow: Moammar Gadhafi through the years

Patrick Kovarik / AFP - Getty Images

A look at the life and times of Libya's mercurial and flamboyant leader

Launch slideshow

Palmer believes Capitana Seas will not contest the court action because it is owed money by Saadi.

'Greedy hands'
Saadi's lawyer, Jerusalem-based Nick Kaufman, did not verify that claim, but told msnbc.com: "Even if Saadi was a director of the company, he was never lawfully served with any legal documentation relating to this outrageously speculative claim."

He added: "The NTC, which has been criticized for a lack of transparency in its own financial dealings, is exploiting the fact that my client is currently subject to wholly unjustified international sanctions and an Interpol red notice for baseless criminal charges -- which it itself instigated.

"As a result my client cannot leave the humanitarian protection afforded him by Niger without fear of unlawful arrest. He can neither travel abroad nor can he get access to funds, at present, to instruct British lawyers to represent his interests in the face of this outrageously speculative claim based on surmise and not evidence."

He added that the court action is "a meritless publicity stunt designed to lay greedy hands on a property that was lawfully acquired."

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BENGHAZI, Libya -- Doctors Without Borders has suspended its work in prisons in the Libyan city of Misrata because it said torture was so rampant that some detainees were brought for care only to make them fit for further interrogation, the group said Thursday.

Amnesty International also said it has recorded widespread prisoner abuse in other cities as well, leading to the death of several inmates.

The allegations, which come more than three months after former leader Moammar Gadhafi was captured and killed, were an embarrassment to the governing National Transitional Council, which is struggling to establish its authority in the divided nation.

Torture-related wounds
Doctors Without Borders said that since August, its medical teams have treated 115 people in Misrata who bore torture-related wounds, including cigarette burns, heavy bruising, bone fractures, tissue burns from electric shocks and kidney failure from beatings. Two detainees died after being interrogated, the group's general director said.

"Patients were brought to us in the middle of interrogation for medical care, in order to make them fit for further interrogation. This is unacceptable," MSF general director Christopher Stokes said in a statement. "Our role is to provide medical care to war casualties and sick detainees, not to repeatedly treat the same patients between torture sessions."

Libya's Western-backed leadership, which has sought to assure the world of its commitment to democracy and human rights, has acknowledged that some prisoners held by revolutionary forces have been abused. It insisted the mistreatment was not systematic and pledged to tackle the problem.

But the transitional government has been unable to rein in the dozens of militias that arose during the war and have been reluctant to disband or submit to central authority.

An official with the Libyan government said it paid attention to all credible reports of abuse.

"There is no doubt that there are acts of violation of human rights but these are to do with the mentality of the people who are in charge of these prisons," the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.

"Neither the government, nor the NTC, nor any Libyan group supports these acts. These actions are individual acts and the authorities will take a very serious view of them."

Beatings and whippings
Amnesty International said in a statement issued Thursday that it has met with a number of detainees in Tripoli, Misrata, and Gharyan who showed visible marks indicating torture, including open wounds on the head, limbs, back and other parts of the body. A number of detainees spoke to Amnesty about beatings with electric cables and metal chains, and they reported being suspended in contorted positions and given electric shocks.

It quoted one man who said he had been tortured earlier this month in the headquarters of Misrata security forces.

"They took me for interrogation upstairs. Five men in plain clothes took turns beating and whipping me," Amnesty quoted the man as saying.

"They suspended me from the top of the door by my wrists for about an hour and kept beating me. They also kicked me."

The London-based group said the torture and mistreatment, mostly against suspected Gadhafi loyalists and sometimes foreign nationals from sub-Saharan African countries, is carried out by officially recognized military and security bodies as well as by a number of armed militias operating outside any legal framework. The group said several detainees died in custody from torture, detailing the death of at least two detainees.

Britain, which played a key role in the NATO-led air campaign that helped revolutionary forces overthrow Gadhafi, urged the new regime to "live up to the high standards they have set themselves."

"They need to ensure a zero tolerance policy on abuse. We are concerned about these reports and are taking them up with the Libyans as a matter of urgency," British Prime Minister David Cameron's office said in a statement.

The head of Amnesty International told The Associated Press the mistreatment of detainees in Libya showed the need for the international community to keep helping the country in its difficult transition. "It's not just a matter of sending in troops and then getting out again. Libya needs long term assistance," Salil Shetty said.

Stokes, of the MSF, told The Associated Press that those subjected to torture include ex-combatants and people accused of theft and looting.

"There is a significant number of people with darker skin, but there is really a wide mix," he said. "Whatever the motives, it is unacceptable to do this to human beings."

The interrogations were carried out by Libya's National Army Security Service at facilities outside the detention centers, MSF said in a statement.

'Couldn't even stand up'
The group, which operates in prisons but not interrogation centers, said it contacted authorities in Misrata, the port city that saw some of the fiercest fighting of the war, to demand an end to the abuse, but it received no official response, prompting MSF to halt its operations in the city's detention centers.

MSF said it will continue its support in Misrata hospitals and schools in addition to providing assistance to African migrants, refugees and internally displaced people in and around Tripoli.

In its statement, MSF said the most alarming case was on Jan. 3, when MSF doctors treated a group of 14 detainees returning from an interrogation center. It said nine of the detainees had numerous injuries, including broken arms and renal failure, and displayed obvious signs of torture.

Stokes said his group has informed the National Army Security Service that a number of patients needed to be transferred to hospitals for urgent and specialized care. All but one of the detainees were deprived of further medical care and hospitalization, and instead taken back to interrogation centers.

"Some of them couldn't even stand up, they were so badly beaten," he said.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report. 

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