A Libyan court has jailed 12 officials in connection with a series of dam collapses in Derna last year that killed thousands of the city’s residents, the prosecutor general announced on Sunday.
The official in charge of managing the country’s dams was sentenced to between nine and 27 years in prison by the Derna Appeals Court; four officials were acquitted.
The coastal city of Derna, with a population of 125,000, was devastated by severe flooding caused by Storm Daniel last September.
Thousands of people were killed and thousands more are missing as floods broke dams, washing away buildings and devastating entire communities.
Tripoli’s prosecutor general said in a statement that three of the defendants had been ordered “to return illegally obtained money”, without revealing the names or positions of those on trial.
“The convicted officials are charged with negligence, premeditated murder and squandering public funds,” a judicial source in Derna told Reuters by telephone, adding that they had the right to appeal against the sentences.
A report released in January by the World Bank, the United Nations and the European Union said the deadly flash floods in Derna were a climate and environmental disaster that required $1.8 billion in rebuilding and restoration.
The report said the dam’s failure was partly due to a design based on outdated hydrological information and partly the result of poor maintenance and governance issues during Libya’s more than decade-long conflict.
Libya has been divided between rival factions controlling the east and west since 2014, when a NATO-backed uprising toppled Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
