From Human Rights Watch, Sept. 4:

The de facto authorities in Tripoli, the National Transitional Council (NTC), should stop the arbitrary arrests and abuse of African migrant workers and black Libyans assumed to be mercenaries, Human Rights Watch said today. They should release those detained as mercenaries solely due to their dark skin color, Human Rights Watch said, and provide prompt judicial review to any for whom there is evidence of criminal activity.

More information emerges on the notorious Abdel Hakim Belhaj—recently an "al-Qaeda-linked terrorist" and now a military commander of Libya's NATO-backed rebels. A Sept. 3 account in The Guardian informs us that he was actually "renditioned" by the CIA from Malaysia to Libya back in 2004, when he was going by the alias Abdullah al-Sadiq:

Libya's provisional authority says five international oil firms are resuming operations in the country, VOA reported Sept. 2. National Transitional Council (NTC) member Aref Ali Nayed said the companies include Italian energy giant ENI. We noted yesterday that BP, at least, is waiting for stability to be restored—as members of the Tuareg minority were apparently just met with harsh reprisals by anti-Qaddafi fighters at the desert town of Ghadames, where BP hopes to drill. But The Guardian reported Sept. 1 that BP is already in talks with the NTC to expand operations in Libya. The Guardian also cites a report Sept. 1 in the Paris daily Libération of a secret deal with the TNC under which French companies would control more than a third of Libya's oil production.

Over the past days, more than 500 Tuaregs, including women and children, have crossed from Libya to Algeria, claiming they were forced to flee their homes by anti-Qaddafi fighters. The Tuaregs have taken refuge at the Algerian desert town of Debdeb, where they are receiving aid from the Red Crescent. Many fled from the Libyan desert city of Ghadames after it was occupied by anti-Qaddafi forces. Refugees said the fighters wrote "Death to Tuaregs" on the city's walls, and killed one Tuareg resident. The governments of Mali and Niger meanwhile report that hundreds of former Tuareg rebels who had gone to Libya to fight for Qaddafi are now returning home. Qaddafi backed the Tuareg insurgencies in Mali and Niger in the 1990s, and then recruited former rebels to fight for him when the Libyan revolution broke out. The reports from Ghadames indicate some anti-Qaddafi forces are now taking retribution against Tuaregs indiscriminately. The Tuaregs are the indigenous people of the interior Sahara, their vast and sparsely populated homeland now divided between the nations of Libya, Algeria, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. (France24, Sept. 2; Ennahar Online, Sept. 1; AFP, Aug. 30)

AlJazeera's Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from Tripoli Aug. 31, claims to have uncovered documents at the ransacked offices of Abdullah Alsinnousi (also rendered al-Senussi)—Qaddafi's intelligence chief (and in-law), now wanted for war crimes—implicating elements of the United States government in supporting the strongman, in violation of official policy. Damaged in a NATO air-strike before being overrun by rebel troops, the office is now in chaos. Elshayyal claims that among the thousands of once-secret documents now littering the floor, he found some that name US political figures as quietly backing the Qaddafi regime—including Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Writes Elshayyal:

The president of Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC), Mustafa Abdel Jalil, denied Aug. 30 any presence of elements of the Polisario Front in the country, in response to a question at a Benghazi press conference about claims aired by Moroccan media that TNC forces have arrested some 556 members of the Western Sahara armed independence movement. The Sahrawi government and the Polisario Front last week said they denied categorically the charges made by the Morocco Board News Service Aug. 25 that Polisario fighters serving as mercenaries for Qaddafi had been detained in Libya. The joint statement called for an urgent independent inquiry into the allegations, and invited the new Libyan authorities to issue a denial. (Sahara Press Service, Aug. 31)

NATO warplanes have carried out repeated air raids on Moammar Qaddafi’s hometown of Sirte over the past three days, as NTC forces advanced on his last major bastion of support. The strikes have hit supply convoys, bunkers and other targets of the Qaddafi-loyalist forces. NTC leaders charge that Qaddafi forces in the town and surrounding villages are using the populace as "human shields," refusing to let residents flee in advance of the impending battle, and even taking over their homes. (Oman Tribune, Aug. 29; The Guardian, Aug. 28; BBC Arabic service via Link TV, Aug. 26)

From ABC News, Aug. 29:

The same man who triumphantly led Libyan rebels into Gadhafi's compound last week first came to the attention of the U.S. intelligence community years ago—as a the founder of a terror group. Abdelhakim Belhaj, who was recently appointed to Tripoli's rebel military council, was one of the original founders of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, an anti-Gadhafi group which was later designated by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization with links to al Qaeda, according to U.S. government reports.