The Head of the Democracy and Human Rights Foundation, Emadeddin Muntasser, confirmed that Virginia court's federal judge had recommended a default judgment against Khalifa Haftar for war crimes and torture lawsuits after the court was notified of his rejection to attend the deposition.

Muntasser told reporters that the recommendation will turn into a final verdict after a deadline of two weeks, during which the defendant's lawyers can file a motion against it, adding that Haftar's lawyers requested during a hearing that they be exempted from representing him in this lawsuit on the pretext that he no longer communicated with them and had not paid their fees.

Muntasser pointed out that the US federal court in Virginia had accepted the request for exemption provided that the lawyers give the court the defendant's correspondence details for later communication.

The Head of the Libyan American Alliance, Essam Omeish, said the judge had responded to the request of the victims families' lawyer for a hearing followed by a move to default judgment due to Haftar's rejection to come to court.

Omeish added that the judge gave Haftar's lawyer the opportunity to respond to Haftar's absence from the court, but the lawyer did not provide any convincing response, saying that all he had offered were flimsy excuses that did not convince the judge.

He also said that the judge announced at the end of the hearing that she would write her recommendations and final verdicts in the 24 hours, adding that the judge said she would then complete the legal procedures for these verdicts: presenting them to the defense attorney and giving Haftar and his lawyer a period of two weeks to respond to the court regarding the verdict. After that, the judge will make the final verdict.