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TUNIS/BENGHAZI. — Tunisian Interior Minister Lotfi Ben Jeddou revealed yesterday the identity of the killer of Mohamed Brahmi, a prominent opposition figure who was shot dead on Thursday by unidentified gunmen. Ben Jeddou said at a press conference that the assassin was Boubaker al-Hakim, a “dangerous” radical Salafist element who was actively wanted by the police for smuggling weapons into the country.
A number of weapons, including automatic pistols and hand grenades, were found in the search of Hakim’s home. Meanwhile, the minister said there was a link between the killer of Chokri Belaid, another opposition leader and head of the Popular Front party who was assassinated on February 6, and the assassin of Brahmi.
He said the same 9 millimeter semi-automatic weapon of Libyan origin was used in both murders, adding that eight individuals belonging to the same radical Islamist group were involved in the two assassinations.
The minister said a special police unit is actively searching for the people involved.
In a related incident, a marksman shot dead a prominent Libyan political activist as he emerged from yesterday prayers at a mosque in the restive eastern city of Benghazi, a security official said.
Abdessalem al-Mesmari, an anti-Islamist lawyer who has been campaigning for a civil state in Libya, “was shot dead as he left a mosque and killed by a single bullet to the heart,” Colonel Mohammed al-Hijazi said.
He said a sharpshooter probably fired the deadly bullet.
It was not immediately clear who shot Mesmari or why.
But he was among the first Libyans who launched an uprising against now slain leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 when he helped found the political wing of rebels who later overthrew the regime.
After the revolution he took a prominent stand against the Muslim Brotherhood, which he accused of striving to take power in Libya despite popular discontent. — Xinhua/AFP.
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