"The SSC troops bundled the doctor into a car and incarcerated him in a base at Naklia, a suburb of Tripoli, where he was beaten and kicked so hard in the groin that he was left with a ruptured testicle.

Diplomats are quietly lobbying Libya's government to issue a guarantee of safety for Forjani. But following Urayath's refusal to step down, the health ministry's plans to reform a health service left in chaos by the Gaddafi dictatorship are in tatters.

"What can we do? We cannot remove him, we have no armed force," said Bubash. "I am one of the people who was threatened. The supreme security council said: 'You can see what will happen to you.' "