Australian Melinda Taylor issued a blistering attack on the justice system of the new Libyan regime, claiming officials there accused her on charges of passing coded messages to Saif al-Islam Gadhafi, when she had simply been innocently doodling on a pad.

Legal obligations

Speaking from the ICC headquarters in The Hague after her release, Ms Taylor told reporters her actions ‘were consistent with my legal obligations’ under the court’s rules. According to the Associated Press news agency, the lawyer maintained that her arrest – and that of three other lawyers – ‘completely underscored that it will be impossible for Mr Gadhafi to be tried in an independent and impartial manner in Libyan courts’.
The Melbourne-based Herald Sun newspaper reported that 36-year-old Ms Taylor took only one day off work following her release before returning to her desk in The Netherlands. The paper quoted her as saying: During [the] 26 days of detention we were never provided with an order or a decision concerning the legal basis for our arrest or detention or for the search and seizure of confidential ICC documents’.