To persecute is to oppress, harass, or bother. To prosecute is to enforce by legal action.
Examples:
- "To announce truths is an infallible recipe for being persecuted."
(Voltaire) - "If you violate Nature's laws you are your own prosecuting attorney, judge, jury, and hangman."
(Luther Burbank)
Practice:
(a) A Turkish prosecutor is considering whether to ______ the Turkish publisher of Richard Dawkins' bestselling atheist polemic, The God Delusion.(b) As a practical matter, governments have always had to consider the question of which groups and practices to tolerate and which to ______.
