The Libyan government was one of the pioneers of what came to be called “The Killing of the Word,” the diabolical campaign that several Arab regimes embarked on in the 1970s. It was accelerated in the 1980s and continues to be occasionally practiced today and therefore cannot be said to have ended. Its main purpose was to get rid of, often in spectacular ways, outspoken journalists: shooting them in the middle of the street, or while eating lunch in a busy restaurant; or abducting them to torture and murder them, leaving their disfigured bodies as a warning to anyone who dared to criticize
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