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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Libya
Index
Once pacification had been accomplished, fascist Italy
endeavored to convert Libya into an Italian province to be referred
to popularly as Italy's Fourth Shore. In 1934 Tripolitania and
Cyrenaica were divided into four provinces--Tripoli, Misratah,
Benghazi, and Darnah--which were formally linked as a single colony
known as Libya, thus officially resurrecting the name that
Diocletian had applied nearly 1,500 years earlier. Fezzan,
designated as South Tripolitania, remained a military territory. A
governor general, called the first consul after 1937, was in
overall direction of the colony, assisted by the General
Consultative Council, on which Arabs were represented. Traditional
tribal councils, formerly sanctioned by the Italian administration,
were abolished, and all local officials were thereafter appointed
by the governor general. Administrative posts at all levels were
held by Italians.
An accord with Britain and Egypt obtained the transfer of a
corner of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, known as the Sarra Triangle, to
Italian control in 1934. The next year, a French-Italian agreement
was negotiated that relocated the 1,000-kilometer border between
Libya and Chad southward about 100 kilometers across the
Aouzou Strip (see Glossary),
but this territorial concession to Italy was
never ratified by the French legislature. In 1939 Libya was
incorporated into metropolitan Italy.
During the 1930s, impressive strides were made in improving the
country's economic and transportation infrastructure. Italy
invested capital and technology in public works projects, extension
and modernization of cities, highway and railroad construction,
expanded port facilities, and irrigation, but these measures were
introduced to benefit the Italian-controlled modern sector of the
economy. Italian development policy after World War I had called
for capital-intensive "economic colonization" intended to promote
the maximum exploitation of the resources available. One of the
initial Italian objectives in Libya, however, had been the relief
of overpopulation and unemployment in Italy through emigration to
the undeveloped colony. With security established, systematic
"demographic colonization" was encouraged by Mussolini's
government. A project initiated by Libya's governor, Italo Balbo,
brought the first 20,000 settlers--the ventimilli--to Libya
in a single convoy in October 1938. More settlers followed in 1939,
and by 1940 there were approximately 110,000 Italians in Libya,
constituting about 12 percent of the total population. Plans
envisioned an Italian colony of 500,000 settlers by the 1960s.
Libya's best land was allocated to the settlers to be brought under
productive cultivation, primarily in olive groves. Settlement was
directed by a state corporation, the Libyan Colonization Society,
which undertook land reclamation and the building of model villages
and offered a grubstake and credit facilities to the settlers it
had sponsored.
The Italians made modern medical care available for the first
time in Libya, improved sanitary conditions in the towns, and
undertook to replenish the herds and flocks that had been depleted
during the war. But, although Mussolini liked to refer to the
Libyans as "Muslim Italians," little more was accomplished that
directly improved the living standards of the Arab population.
Beduin life was disrupted as tribal grazing lands--considered
underutilized by European standards but potentially fertile if
reclaimed--were purchased or confiscated for distribution to
Italian settlers. Complete neglect of education for Arabs prevented
the development of professional and technical training, creating a
shortage of skilled workers, technicians, and administrators that
had not been alleviated in the late 1980s. Sanusi leaders were
harried out of the country, lodges broken up, and the order
suppressed, although not extinguished.
Data as of 1987
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