Joy, lust for revenge in "Free Libya" (News Feature)

By dpa correspondents Feb 25, 2011, 14:26 GMT

Tobruk, Libya - Not even a sandstorm can make the people massing in Tobruk's Martyrs Square go home.

Cars, horns honking, circle the plaza, where an old Libyan monarchy flag has been placed along with photographs of people killed in the North African country's recent unrest.

They also include a picture of Mahdi Elias, a student executed in the square in 1984 as an enemy of Moamer Gaddafi's regime.

Some of the approximately 500 people gathered in the square to celebrate what they say is their city's liberation from 'Moamer's rogue regime' would like to see Gaddafi put to death soon too.

Calls for revenge punctuate the euphoria of their victory over soldiers and mercenaries sent by the government to quash anti-Gaddafi protests.

'We've torn down the wall of fear here. Now the fear is in Tripoli, with Gaddafi,' Abdulhamid Abu Bakr said.

The 53-year-old said he has a score to settle with Gaddafi. He claimed that as a young man, he spent a year and a half behind bars as a political prisoner and was tortured.

Abu Bakr says he is glad his countrymen in eastern Libya have shaken off a regime that enslaved them for decades while proclaiming 'the rule of the people.'

And he goes further: 'All Arab people should have the opportunity for self-determination,' he said.

Tobruk is littered with destruction. Intoxicated by their revolt, inhabitants of the city set most public buildings alight.

Members of newly formed self-defence militias proudly show journalists the building once housing the secret police, now gutted by fire.

After days without fresh bread, it is now being passed out for free on the street. People who heard the news on the local radio station, now calling itself Radio Free Tobruk, are flocking to get their share.

The director of Al Batnan Medical Centre, Abdulrasak Zidan, is also rejoicing. A few hours earlier, he received a relief shipment of medical supplies from Egypt. After days of violence and fear, he says he now sees things improving.

Saleh Fuad, an engineer working for Libya's state oil company, has hopes for economic progress in the east of the country, where the infrastructure is much worse than in the Tripoli region.

'We produce 300,000 barrels of oil a day in Tobruk,' he said. 'Where has the money gone? Into the pockets of Gaddafi and his family,' he said.

Billboards with the face of the 'Brother Leader,' a feature of every Libyan town, lay smashed in the Tobruk dust.

Gaddafi still controls the capital Tripoli and smaller cities in the west, but most people in Tobruk, Bayda, Benghazi, Derna and other eastern cities are convinced that his time is up.

They are already making plans for a march on Tripoli.

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