Public Prosecutor orders the arrest of five people on charges of gold prospecting.

Tripoli, December 4, 2023 (Lana) The Public Prosecutor ordered the imprisonment of four foreigners and a Libyan person on charges of violating the rules of entering and residing in the country and prospecting for gold in violation of legislation.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office stated on its Facebook page that the Judicial Officer of the Libyan Intelligence Service monitored the presence of four Chinese people in the country without their presence being accompanied by proof of their passage through the state’s ports, so his suspicions led to clarifying the fact that those suspected of being involved in a group that manages the gold mining activity in violation of legislation.

The office added that the police officer conducted a preliminary investigation, after which the Deputy Public Prosecutor, in the Tripoli Public Prosecutor’s Office, was able to understand the will of a Libyan person to organize gold mining activity with the help of infiltrators from Niger, Chad, and China.

The office explained that the Libyan person assigned some foreigners to prospecting for gold in four surface basins created by infiltrators in southern Libya without the approval of the authorities, and the rest of them were assigned to transporting the research extracts to laboratories prepared to recrystallize and purify them.

The office indicated that the investigator was imprisoning five defendants, including a Libyan who was managing their affairs, and referring the proposal to respond to the infringement of the economic component to the Attorney General.

=Lana=