Libya to free 38 radical Islamists: attorney general

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - The Libyan government will release 38 more members of a radical Islamist group jailed for plotting to overthrow the government of Muammar Gaddafi, the country's attorney general Abderhmane al Abbar said Monday.

"The authorities has taken the decision to release the 38 prisoners and they are expected to leave jail today or tomorrow. It is just a matter of procedure," he told Reuters.

Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) leaders, jailed in Abu Salim on the outskirts of Tripoli, have been negotiating a deal over the past two years to renounce violence and its radical brand of Islam in exchange for the release of LIFG members.

It was not clear whether the remaining LIFG leaders would be among the 38 prisoners to be freed. At least 254 members of the group have been released in batches over nearly three years.

Human rights groups say Libyan security forces killed 1,200 prisoners in 1996 in Abu Salim during fighting between the army and LIFG militants in several villages and towns around Benghazi, the hotbed of opposition to Gaddafi's government.

Three top officials from the group were freed early this year through negotiations spearheaded by reform-minded Saif al Islam, Gaddafi's most influential son.

Libyan newspapers said LIFG's jailed leadership issued a book last year that was hailed by some Islamic scholars as "opening a new window" to promote moderate Islam.

A number of Islamic scholars cast doubt about the intellectual legitimacy of the book, arguing that jailed LIFG leaders were not free to express their genuine thoughts.

LIFG fought battles in city streets and in the mountains in the 1990s, killing dozens of soldiers and policemen, as part of its attempts to overthrow Gaddafi.

According to Libyan political and security sources, al Qaeda has been courting LIFG to join its North Africa wing but most of the group's leadership opposed al Qaeda's global strategy and believed it was unlikely to bring about any change in Libya.

Political sources in Tripoli said that up to 300 Islamists from LIFG and other radical groups were still in prison, not including the new batch of prisoners to be released this week.

(Reporting by Ali Shuaib and Writing by Lamine Ghanmi; Editing by Louise Ireland)