Libya
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Libya is a country in North Africa. It lies with the Mediterranean coast in the north, and borders with Egypt in the east, Sudan in the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia in the west. Libya is home to 1.8 million square kilometers of Africa’s fourth largest country in terms of area and the 16th largest in the world. Of Libya’s 5.7 million residents live 1.7 million in the capital Tripoli. The country is traditionally divided into Tripolitania, Fezzan and Cyrenaika.
Libya has the third highest GDP (PPP) per. capita in Africa, only Seychelles and South Africa have higher. An important reason for this is the country’s large oil reserves and low population.
Libya has since 1969 been led by Muammar al-Gaddafi, whose foreign policy has often brought him into conflict with the West and other African governments. Libya has abandoned its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and Libya’s relations with the outside world is currently less inflamed.
Libya’s flag is the only national flag in the world with only one color and without any pattern, symbols or other details.
Archaeological finds indicate that the plains along the coast of Libya was inhabited as early as the 8th millennium BC of a Neolithic people who are both established livestock of cattle and drove crops. The area today known as Libya, have been subject to a number of different ethnic groups. Both the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals and Byzantines ruled over the whole or parts of the area. Apart from the ruins at Cyrene, Leptis Magna and Sabratha, left by the Greeks and Romans, respectively, there are few traces of these ancient cultures.
The Phoenicians
The Phoenicians were the first to establish trading stations in Libya, as a traveling salesman from Tyr (in today’s Lebanon) developed trade relations with the Berber tribes and made agreements with them to secure their cooperation in extraction of raw materials. During the the fifth century BC had Carthage, the largest of the Phoenician colonies, extended its hegemony across much of North Africa from which punerne emerged as one’s own civilization. Punic settlements along the coast of Libya included Oea (Tripoli), Libda (Leptis Magna) and Sabratha. All these were in an area which was later called Tripolis, or “Three Cities”. Libya’s current capital Tripoli takes its name from this area.
Greeks
The Greeks conquered Eastern Libya when, according to tradition, emigrants from the crowded island of Thera were commanded by the oracle at Delphi to find a new home in North Africa. In 631 BC they founded the city of Cyrene. Before there had been 200 years had four more important Greek cities were established in the area: Barka (Al Marj) Euhesperides (later known as Bernice, in day Benghazi) Teuchira (later Arsinoe, today Tukrah) and Apollonia (Susah), which was Kyrenes seaport. Together with Cyrene, they were known as Pentapolis (Five cities).
Romans
Romans Joined regions of Libya, and in more than 400 years Tripolitania and Cyrenaika prosperous Roman provinces. Roman ruins, which they found in Leptis Magna, testifies to a vibrant region where the populous cities and also people in small towns enjoy the conveniences of city life. Merchants and artisans from many parts of the Roman world established themselves in North Africa, but the cities of Tripolitania kept its Punic character traits and Cyrenaika his Greek.
Arabs
During Caliph Uthman’s reign conquered the Arabs, led by General Abdullah ibn Saad, Libya in the 7th century AD The following centuries brought a large proportion of the population in Libya is Islam, also the Arabic language and culture.
Ottomans
Osmanske Turks conquered the country in mid 1500-century and the three provinces or wilaya Tripolitania, Fezzan and Cyrenaika (which together represent Libya) remained part of the osmanske rich, with the exception of a period of autonomy under Karamanlidynastiet. Karamanlidynastiet reigned from 1711 to 1835, mostly in Tripolitania, but they also had an impact also in the Fezzan and Cyrenaika in the mid 1700′s. This constituted a first glimpse of the reunited and independent Libya which was resurrected two centuries later. The reunion happened, ironically, by an invasion (The Italo-Turkish War, 1911-1912) and an occupation from 1911, when Italy simultaneously reversed the three regions into colonies.
Italian colony
Italy assumed the name “Libya” (used by the Greeks for all of North Africa, except Egypt) as the official name of the colony (which consisted of three provinces Cyrenaika, Tripolitania and Fezzan). King Idris first, Emir of Cyrenaika, led the resistance against the Italian occupation authorities between the two world wars. In the years 1943 to 1951 was Tripolitania and Cyrenaika under British administration, while France controlled Fezzan. Idris returned from the asylum in Cairo in 1944, but refused to settle permanently in Cyrenaika until any foreign control was removed in 1947. Under the terms of peace with the Allies in 1947, Italy gave up all claims related to Libya.
Omar Mukhtar (1858-1931) led the Libyan uprising against Italian occupation.
Kingdom of Libya
On 21 November 1949 took the UN General Assembly a resolution which stated that Libya should become independent before the first January 1952. Idris represented Libya in the subsequent negotiations with the UN. 24. December 1951 Libya declared its independence as the Kingdom of Libya, a constitutional, hereditary monarchy under King Idris.
The discovery of substantial oil reserves in 1959 and the subsequent revenue from oil sales made to Libya went from being one of the world’s poorest nations to be a very prosperous state. Although oil is made possible dramatic increases in government budgets, there was a stronger misnøje in population over the growing concentration of national wealth that fell into the hands of King Idris and the country’s elite incidentally. This mining continued to increase since nasser-Semitism and Arab nationalism was spreading in North Africa and Middle East.
Gaddafi’s coup
1. September 1969 conducted a small group of officers led by officer Muammar Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi, a coup against King Idris. Idris was in Turkey for medical treatment when this happened. His nephew, Prince Sayyid Hasan ar-Rida al-Mahdi as-Sanussi, became the new king. It was quickly clarified that the revolutionary officers who had announced the departure of King Idris, did not want Sayyid as the new king, and he was deposed and placed under house arrest the same day. The monarchy was abolished and Gaddafi, who saw Libya as the new Libyan Arab Republic, is still called “Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution” in official statements and press.
Liechtenstein & Liberia