Ex-radio engineer for Gaddafi regime uses newfound freedom to broadcast encouraging messages to rebels in Tripoli

When Benghazi fell into the hands of the opposition a week ago, Saleh Zayani grabbed two sound mixers and a microphone and headed to the radio transmission building. His friends were too afraid to join him, so Zayani went with an armed guard, plugged in his equipment and began to speak. "This is free Libya, and Tripoli is our capital," he proclaimed at 2 p.m. on Feb. 21. Radio Free Libya has been broadcasting uninterrupted every day since.

Zayani found his voice in the same place he had worked, stifled and fearful, for two decades as a sound engineer, transmitting the messages of Moammar Gaddafi's regime. Slowly others joined him, and now a group of 20 that includes engineers, revolutionaries and broadcasters keeps the station operating. The work never stops, and the message - which reaches Tripoli and beyond, as far west as Zawiyah - is as important as the forces being sent to Tripoli to support the uprising there, Zayani said. He weeps when he talks about what drives him. "It was the blood. I saw them killing the people. I saw people I knew that were killed," he said, dropping his face in his hands. At least 220 people were slain in the battle with Gaddafi forces for control of the town, doctors here say.