Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi (left) and Brazilian plastic surgeon Dr Liacyr Ribeiro pose for a photo in Tripoli, Libya in 1994. -- PHOTO: AP
SAO PAULO - IT WAS well past midnight when the Brazilian surgeon says he was escorted deep inside a bunker in the Libyan capital.
His assignment: to shave years off Muammar Gaddafi's appearance by removing fat from his belly and injecting it into his wrinkled face. The Libyan leader also got hair plugs.
'He told me that he had been in power for 25 years at that time, and that he did not want the young people of his nation to see him as an old man,' Dr Liacyr Ribeiro recalled. 'I recommended a facelift, but he refused.'
The secretive four-hour procedure in 1995 was done, at Gaddafi's insistence, with local anesthesia because he wanted to remain alert. Midway through, the Libyan leader stopped to have a hamburger.
Gaddafi was worried a facelift would be too noticeable, so he opted for the less radical procedure, the plastic surgeon told The Associated Press.
'I warned Gaddafi that the effects of the operation I performed would last for about five years, that it had an expiration date after which the skin would sag and the wrinkles would reappear,' Dr Ribeiro said. 'He said he would call me if he needed me to come back,' and about five years ago there was such a request, but Dr Ribeiro had a family obligation. 'They never called me again,' he said. -- AP
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