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‘Do you know right from wrong?’ Ironic last-known words of Khadafy

SIRTE, Libya — A bloodied and beaten Moammar Khadafy asked the fighters who captured him “Do you know right from wrong?” in what could well have been the final words of the ousted Libyan dictator.

New video footage emerged Friday showing the former strongman apparently in his last moments, surrounded and pleading for his life, repeatedly telling the mob swarming around him, “What you are doing is forbidden in Islamic law.”

One of the group is heard responding, “Shut up you dog,” as the armed fighters fired celebratory bullets in the air.

The footage ends with Khadafy telling them, “What you are doing is wrong … Do you know right from wrong?”

The irony of his plea would not be lost on the thousands of Libyans who suffered under Khadafy’s tyrannical 42-year regime, nor the international community which laid the blame for a long list of atrocities at his door, most notably the 1988 Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people, mainly Americans.

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Khadafy was killed shortly after his capture Thursday amid the final assault by Transitional National Council (TNC) forces on his hometown of Sirte, which was assisted by a NATO airstrike.

A statement confirmed NATO aircraft struck 11 pro-Khadafy military vehicles, which were among a heavily-armed convoy of 75 vehicles that was transporting Khadafy away from Sirte “at high speed” at around 8:30 a.m. local time Thursday.

The Wall Street Journal reported that US officials confirmed that an American Predator drone took part in the airstrike and fired on the convoy. French aircraft also launched guided missiles, WSJ said.

“At the time of the strike, NATO did not know that Khadafy was in the convoy,” the NATO statement said, “NATO’s intervention was conducted solely to reduce the threat towards the civilian population, as required to do under our UN mandate. As a matter of policy, NATO does not target individuals.”

NATO officials added, “We later learned from open sources and Allied intelligence that Khadafy was in the convoy and that the strike likely contributed to his capture.”

Interim Libyan prime minister Mahmoud Jibril announced later Thursday that Khadafy was fatally injured after being caught in crossfire between his own supporters and rebel fighters.

Other reports, and several videos that have since emerged, seemed to point to a summary execution following his capture by the TNC fighters. Yet another account suggested Khadafy was shot by his own bodyguards.

A Libyan doctor, Ibrahim Tika, confirmed Friday that Khadafy was shot in the head, but he said it was a bullet wound to the intestines that claimed the dictator’s life.

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“There was a bullet and that was the primary reason for his death, it penetrated his gut,” Tika told Al Arabiya television. “Then there was another bullet in the head that went in and out of his head.”

Tika said he also inspected the fatal wounds to Khadafy’s son, Mutassim, confirming he had died after his father following several large wounds across his torso and the back of a leg.

Another son, heir-apparent Saif al Islam, was said to have reached Ghat on the Algerian border as he attempts to flee the country, Sky News reported.

It also emerged Friday that a third Khadafy son, Saadi, attempted to cut a deal for his father 10 days ago from Niger, contacting the head of the military in Tripoli, Abdul Hakim Belhaj.

Sky News learned Saadi Khadafy offered Belhaj the chance to join forces to “work against foreign occupation,” saying that his aging father “recognized he will not lead Libya again.”

International human rights groups, including Amnesty, and the UN human rights chief Navi Pillay have urged an investigation to clear up the facts surrounding Khadafy’s death. But the UN said it had not been contacted in relation to media reports that Khadafy’s wife had appealed for an international investigation into her husband’s killing.

The manner of his demise seemed to matter little to the Libyans who celebrated through the night in preparation of a new dawn in the troubled North African country.

Khadafy’s death means the transitional government in Libya can avoid a long trial and proceed quickly with plans to declare the country “liberated” as soon as Saturday, and set up a new administration in the capital, Tripoli, without threat of an insurgency led by the former dictator.

The immediate future of the NATO mission in Libya, meanwhile, remains to be decided. Ambassadors from the 28-nation military alliance were due to meet in Brussels at 3:00 p.m. local time (9:00 a.m. ET), with the French president Nicolas Sarkozy already indicating Friday that the NATO operation was “coming to its end.”

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pledged ongoing commitment to start building a democracy in Libya, during a Friday news conference in Pakistan.

Khadafy’s remains, which are reportedly being kept in a market freezer on the outskirts of Misrata, will be buried at a secret location, a TNC official announced Friday, saying the ceremony had been delayed for “a few days.”

A report in The Washington Post suggested that when Libyan officials ran a series of DNA, hair and saliva tests at the hospital to prove his identity, the hair turned out to be a wig.

Burials under Islamic tradition are normally carried out within 24 hours of the death. The postponement bought the Libyan officials more time to decide where to bury Khadafy’s body so that it does not become a shrine to his surviving supporters.