People sign a condolence book for Ambassador Chris Stevens at the U.S. Capitol on Sept. 14, 2012, in Washington, D.C. | Getty Benghazi aide to Chris Stevens slams 'political attacks'

The Libyan man whose job was to coordinate Ambassador Chris Stevens’ fateful 2012 trip to Benghazi, Libya, decried the political attacks surrounding Stevens’ death as damaging to the late ambassador’s true legacy.

Bubaker Habib, a local contractor who worked for the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, described Stevens in a Washington Post opinion piece as a dedicated diplomat who knew the risks of his trip to the Libyan city but felt compelled to go anyways. To use his death to advance a political agenda, Habib said, is “offensive, to me, to the truth and to Chris’s memory.”


“The political attacks based on the events of that night portray Chris not as the hero and leader that he was but as the pawn and the victim of incompetence or worse in Washington,” Habib wrote, identifying Stevens as "my friend." “To allow a cloud of false and misguided allegations to remain over Chris would be to compound that loss. His memory and mission must be given the true honor and recognition they deserve.”

Habib, who watched from the tarmac as Stevens’ body was loaded onto a U.S. bound plane and later immigrated to America when it became clear he was no longer safe in Libya, said he has been approached by parties asking him, sometimes via threats or offers of payment, to endorse what he called “false versions of events that night.”

Habib did not say who had made those approaches, but said he has already offered the true version of events to law enforcement, the State Department and the House Select Committee on Benghazi. Habib said the blame for the ambassador’s death “rests entirely and unquestionably on those who carried out the attacks.”

“The repeated attempts to get me to endorse unfounded theories and the fact that politicians and others continue to revive false narratives and accusations have pushed me to step out from the shadows,” Habib wrote. “Chris does not deserve to have his legacy undermined in this way.”