ISTANBUL

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the son of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, was killed in the western Libyan city of Zintan, his lawyer Khaled al-Zaidi and adviser Abdullah Osman said late Tuesday.

Libyan media reported that the killing took place at his residence and was carried out by four unidentified individuals, adding that surveillance cameras at the site were disabled prior to the attack.

The Libyan Attorney General’s Office has opened an investigation into the killing, according to local media.

Details surrounding the killing remain unclear, and Libyan authorities have yet to issue an official confirmation.

Via his Facebook page, Moussa Ibrahim, a former spokesman for the Gaddafi regime, wrote: "They killed him treacherously while he wanted a unified, sovereign Libya, safe for all its people...They assassinated hope and a future, and planted hatred and animosity."

Regarding his assassination, Ibrahim said: "The goal is more bloodshed, Libya's division and the destruction of every project for national unity, serving the interests of foreigners in the country."

The Libyan News Agency quoted the "444th Brigade" affiliated with the Defense Ministry of the Government of National Unity as "categorically” denying what is being circulated on social media platforms regarding its connection to the clashes that occurred in the city of Zintan and the accompanying news about the killing of Saif al-Islam.

Since his capture during the armed revolution that toppled his father's regime in 2011, Saif al-Islam has lived in the city of Zintan, located 136 kilometers (85 miles) southwest of the capital Tripoli, but no one publicly knew his location even after his release in 2017.

In recent years, Saif al-Islam's name has emerged in the political scene amid a disagreement over his candidacy for presidential elections that Libyans still hope will be held in the country to end its crises.

Libya remains divided between two rival administrations: one led by Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh in Tripoli, which controls the west of the country, and another appointed by the House of Representatives (parliament) in early 2022 led by Osama Hammad and based in Benghazi, which governs the east and much of the south.