Captured al-Qaeda Honcho Being Held on Navy Ship

Looks like boats are the new Guantanamo Bay: The Libyan al-Qaeda leader captured by American special forces on the weekend is being held on a Navy ship for interrogation and will probably next see land when he is sent to New York City for prosecution, the New York Times reports. Officials say Abu Anas al-Libi, believed to have been one of the masterminds between the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, is likely to receive the same treatment as a Somali terror suspect who was held and interrogated on a Navy ship for two months after his capture in 2011, without being read his rights or provided with a lawyer.

Abu Anas—a computer expert believed to have a huge amount of information on al-Qaeda's activities over the last 20 years—is "currently lawfully detained under the law of war in a secure location outside of Libya," the Pentagon says. He was indicted by a New York court in 2000 in connection with the embassy attacks. The raid that captured him outside his Tripoli home appears to have come as a surprise to Libyan authorities, who say the government is "keen on prosecuting any Libyan citizen inside Libya" and has asked the US "for clarification on this matter," reports the BBC. (More Libya stories.)