Gaddafi buried in secret grave

Al Jazeera

MISRATA (Libya), Oct 25: Libya's National Transitional Council has buried Muammar Gaddafi, his son Mutassim and a former aide at a secret location in the desert at dawn, sources told Al Jazeera. Al Jazeera's correspondent Hoda Hamid reported from Misrata that the Qaddafa tribe had asked for the bodies to be delivered to them and to be buried in his hometown of Sirte, in accordance to Gaddafi's will, but this request was refused. "The NTC did not want the grave to become a shrine, so tribe members were allowed to pray over the body before it was buried, and then NTC commanders took his body into the unknown location in the desert and buried it," she said.The burial is said to have taken place at 5am local time (3am GMT). Hamid also said that after four days of public viewing in the freezer, the bodies had to be moved. "One of the reasons was that decomposition could not be slowed down as a result of the door constantly being opened" to allow for viewers, she said. Earlier, the NTC ordered an investigation into the death of Gaddafi after international pressure to examine the circumstances surrounding his death. A commission of inquiry is being put in place to investigate the killing of Gaddafi, who was captured by NTC fighters outside Sirte on Thursday and shot shortly afterwards, apparently while being transported to Misrata. "In response to international calls, we have started to put in place a commission tasked with investigating the circumstances of Muammar Gaddafi's death in the clash with his circle as he was being captured," Mustafa Abdel Jalil (right), the head of the NTC, said in Bengazi on Monday. Abdel Jalil also announced that the process of forming a new interim government was already under way, and would be completed "within two weeks". He said all Libyans "wanted to try [Gaddafi] for what he has done to them. From executions, to imprisonment, to throwing away the Libyan wealth ... or using that wealth against the Libyan people". The NTC has insisted that Gaddafi was killed in "crossfire" between NTC fighters and pro-Gaddafi loyalists after his capture from a drainage pipe outside his hometown, Sirte. Some members of the NTC, as well as of the international community, have expressed doubt over this version of events. The US, Britain and international rights groups have all called for an investigation into how Gaddafi was killed in what appeared to be one of the final acts of Libya's eight-month civil war.