Gaddafi’s daughter exhibits paintings glorifying the Libyan dictator in Moscow

Ayesha Gaddafi’s art is on display at an exhibition dedicated to his memory

Muammar Gaddafi’s daughter has unveiled a painting of her dead father’s bloody body as part of an exhibition dedicated to his memory in Moscow.
Ayesha Gaddafi, a trained lawyer who once held a prominent position under her father’s regime, is the fifth child of Col Gaddafi, a brutal dictator who ruled Libya for 42 years.
The painting shows the bodies of her father and brother, who were killed in 2011. They are covered with bloody sheets and a crowd stands by the corpses, using smartphones to take pictures of the bodies. A fist holding cash hovers above.
Ms Gaddafi told journalists at the opening that the artwork was “painted not with my hand, but with my heart”.
She fled Libya during the uprising in 2011 and was initially granted asylum in Algeria, but tensions arose due to her public expressions of loyalty to her father’s regime. She left in 2013 and relocated to Oman.
According to the family, Ms Gaddafi’s husband and two of her children were killed in Nato airstrikes in Tripoli.
Igor Spivak, chief of the body which organised the exhibit with support from Russia’s foreign ministry, said Ms Gaddafi knows “the people in Russia love her, love her father and want to see her art in Russia”.
The six-week exhibition of dozens of her artworks called Daughter of Libya opened on Friday at the State Museum of Oriental Art.
Col Gaddafi was a dictator and tyrant whose authoritarian administration financed terrorism and systematically violated human rights.
After rebels captured the city of Sirte during the Nato-backed uprising that toppled him, Gaddafi was taken prisoner and later killed in a public lynching, collapsing his regime.
Ms Gaddifi’s brother, Muatassim Gaddafi, the fifth son and commander of the loyalist forces in Sirt, also died during the rebellion.
Russia regards Libya as one of its strongest allies in the Arab world and President Vladimir Putin has previously accused US special forces of being involved in Col Gaddafi’s killing.