Libya Welcomes Banned Books

The books Gadhafi once banned are banned no more.

From an article in the Toronto Star...

With a fanfare of Libyan bagpipers in full ceremonial flourish, the VIP crowd made its way to the top for of the palace, heaped with table upon table of books deemed unreadable during Moammar Gadhafi’s 42-year rule.

There, Arabic titles including The Secret Life of Saddam Hussein and The CIA Files of Arab Rulers sat alongside censored troves of Islamic literature, theology and philosophy. Books about Israel, Hezbollah, books by Salmon Rushdie. One slim volume was titled Sex In The Arab World.

The palace, converted to a library and museum during Gadhafi’s post-royalist rule, grew quiet as half dozen speakers took turns remembering the dead and wounded that sacrificed for this day.

“Here in this historic place, knowledge was banned. The previous regime called it a national library, but it was more like an indoctrination centre to control our thinking,” said Dr. Salah Abdallah Rajeb al-Aghab, a senior official with the Libyan government archeology section.

“This place was used to distort culture. It was used to terrorize. And so this is the proper place to say Libya now is ready to embrace knowledge and thought without limits.”