The Italian refugees from Libya were the Italian settlers and their descendants who were forced out of Libya after the end of WWII. [1] Most took refuge in Italy, mainly after their expulsion in 1970, ordered by Muammar Gaddafi. [2]
The Italian refugees from Libya were the Italian settlers and their descendants who were forced out of Libya after the end of WWII. [1] Most took refuge in Italy, mainly after their expulsion in 1970, ordered by Muammar Gaddafi. [2]
The era of international decolonization led to an exodus of Italians from what used to be the colony of Italian Libya, especially after Libya became independent in the 1950s. Nearly half of the Italian colonists [3] who arrived when governor Italo Balbo brought to Libya his "Ventimilli" in 1938-1939, [4] went away in the late 1940s: [5] this first wave of refugees moved to Italy; soon afterwards, in the early 1950s, most of them emigrated to the Americas (mainly to Canada, Venezuela, Argentina and the United States) and to western Europe (France, Benelux, etc.).
After several years under British mandate, on December 24, 1951 Libya declared its independence as the United Kingdom of Libya (a constitutional, hereditary monarchy under King Idris). In 1952 the exodus of most of the remaining Italian colonial settlers started, mainly those in areas away from the main cities.
Although in the late 1950s most of the 110,000 Italians living in 1940 Italian Libya [6] had already left the former colony, some thousands remained (primarily farmers and craftsmen) and some even tried to participate in the political life of the new Libya. [7] King Idris was a relatively tolerant monarch, and generally treated the Italian population well: in 1964 Libya there still were 27000 Italians, of which 24000 lived in the metropolitan area of Tripoli.
| Year | Italians | Percentage | Libya inhabitants | Reference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1939 | 108,419 | 12.37% | 876,563 | Guida Breve d'Italia Vol. III, C.T.I. Milano, 1939 |
| 1962 | 35,000 | 2.1% | 1,681,739 | Enciclopedia Motta, Vol. VIII, Motta Editore. Milano, 1969 |
| 1982 | 1,500 | 0.05% | 2,856,000 | Atlante Geografico Universale, Fabbri Editori. Bologna, 1988 |
| 2012 | 624 | 0.01% | 3,400,000 | Ministero Interni-"AIRE". Roma, 2013 |
But after 1970 the Italian population almost disappeared when Colonel Muammar Gaddafi ordered the expulsion of all Italians colonists settlers and Jews from Libya. [8] Already in 1967, as a consequence of the Six-Day War, through an airlift and the aid of several ships, the Italian Navy helped evacuate more than 6,000 Libyan Jews to Rome in one month. [9] These Jewish evacuees were forced to leave their homes, their businesses and most of their possessions behind: of these 6,000, about 4,000 soon emigrated to Israel or the United States, while the ones who remained stayed in Rome, because they all spoke Italian and were fully integrated with the Italian way of life since 1911. Out of the approximately 15,000 Roman Jews, actually 4,000 are of Libyan descent, and constitute an influential part of the community.
Indeed in 1970, after the advent of the Libyan revolution, more than twenty thousand Italian colonists settlers in Libya were suddenly expelled from the country and, like the Jews in 1967, suffered the confiscation of all property. This was in violation of the treaty between Italy and Libya signed in 1956: this treaty was concluded on the basis of a UN Resolution of 1950, which linked the creation of the independent Libyan monarchy to the respect the rights and interests of the minorities living in the country. Some Italians of Libya wanted to organize a "resistance" political group to protect their past hegemony. [10]
The value of the assets lost by the Italians expelled has been calculated in 1970 by the Italian government in 200 billion lire based on real estate property value alone. Including bank deposits and various entrepreneurial activities, this figure exceeds 400 billion lire that equals about 3 billion euro or dollars of 2006.
The Confiscation of 1970 was justified by Qaddafi (then president-dictator of Libya) as partial relief for the damages resulting from colonization.
Regarding "Visas" in Libya, after the initial enthusiasm following the visit of the then Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to Gaddafi in 2004, in which the problem seemed to be overcome, nearly nothing was done: up to 2011 Italian citizens repatriated in 1970 could not return to the country until after the age of 65, through an organized trip and with the entry documents authorized both in Italian and Arabic. Even those born in Libya were denied access, as was the case of international actress Rossana Podestà who complained to have been denied the possibility of returning to her "Italian Tripoli" birthplace after 1970.
In 2014 the Italian embassy in Tripoli was one of the few Western embassies still active in Libya during the Post-civil war violence in Libya due to the fact that Italy was the most important trade partner for Libya and that there were 624 Italians working in Italian companies in the country. [11] [12]
Few Italians remain in Libya. Italian refugees from Libya maintain their own organization called Associazione Italiani Rimpatriati dalla Libia (AIRL). [13] [14]
Libya, officially the State of Libya, is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad to the south, Niger to the southwest, Algeria to the west, and Tunisia to the northwest. Libya is made of three historical regions: Tripolitania, Fezzan, and Cyrenaica. With an area of almost 700,000 square miles, it is the fourth-largest country in Africa and the Arab world, and the 16th-largest in the world. Libya has the 10th-largest proven oil reserves in the world. The largest city and capital, Tripoli, is located in western Libya and contains over three million of Libya's seven million people.
Saif al-Islam Muammar al-Gaddafi is a Libyan political figure. He is the second son of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and his second wife Safia Farkash. He was a part of his father's inner circle, performing public relations and diplomatic roles on his behalf. He publicly turned down his father's offer of the country's second highest post and held no official government position. According to United States Department of State officials in Tripoli, during his father's reign, he was the second most widely recognized person in Libya, being at times the de facto Prime Minister, and was mentioned as a possible successor, though he rejected this. An arrest warrant was issued for him on 27 June 2011 by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for charges of crimes against humanity against the Libyan people, for killing and persecuting civilians, under Articles 7(1)(a) and 7(1)(h) of the Rome statute. He denied the charges.
Zuwarah, or Zuwara or Zwara is a coastal Berber-speaking city in Libya.
The history of the Jews in Libya stretches back to the 3rd century BCE, when Cyrenaica was under Greek rule. The Jewish population of Libya, a part of the Sephardi-Maghrebi Jewish community continued to populate the area continuously until the modern times. During World War II, Libya's Jewish population was subjected to anti-semitic laws by the Fascist Italian regime and deportations by Nazi German troops.
The Italian colonizationof Libya began in 1911 and it lasted until 1943. The country, which was previously an Ottoman possession, was occupied by Italy in 1911 after the Italo-Turkish War, which resulted in the establishment of two colonies: Italian Tripolitania and Italian Cyrenaica. In 1934, the two colonies were merged into one colony which was named the colony of Italian Libya. In 1937, this colony was divided into four provinces, and in 1939, the coastal provinces became a part of metropolitan Italy. The colonization lasted until Libya's occupation by Allied forces in 1943, but it was not until the 1947 Paris Peace Treaty that Italy officially renounced all of its claims to Libya's territory.
Sirte, also spelled Sirt, Surt, Sert or Syrte, is a city in Libya. It is located south of the Gulf of Sirte, between Tripoli and Benghazi. It is famously known for its battles, ethnic groups, and loyalty to Muammar Gaddafi. Also due to developments in the First Libyan Civil War, it was briefly the capital of Libya as Tripoli's successor after the Fall of Tripoli from 1 September to 20 October 2011. The settlement was established in the early 20th century by the Italians, at the site of a 19th-century fortress built by the Ottomans. It grew into a city after World War II.
Libya was a colony of the Fascist Italy located in North Africa, in what is now modern Libya, between 1934 and 1943. It was formed from the unification of the colonies of Italian Cyrenaica and Italian Tripolitania, which had been Italian possessions since 1911.
Islam is the dominant religion in Libya. Other than the vast majority of Sunni Muslims, there are also small Christian communities, composed exclusively of immigrants. Coptic Orthodox Christianity, which is the Christian Church of Egypt, is the largest and most historical Christian denomination in Libya. There are over 60,000 Egyptian Copts in Libya, as they comprise over 1% of the population alone. There are an estimated 40,000 Roman Catholics in Libya who are served by two Bishops, one in Tripoli and one in Benghazi. There is also a small Anglican community, made up mostly of African immigrant workers in Tripoli; it is part of the Anglican Diocese of Egypt.
Italian Tripolitania was an Italian colony, located in present-day western Libya, that existed from 1911 to 1934. It was part of the territory conquered from the Ottoman Empire after the Italo-Turkish War in 1911. Italian Tripolitania included the western northern half of Libya, with Tripoli as its main city. In 1934, it was unified with Italian Cyrenaica in the colony of Italian Libya.
Italian settlers in Libya typically refers to Italians and their descendants, who resided or were born in Libya during the Italian colonial period.
The Libyan Coastal Highway, formerly the Litoranea Balbo, is a highway that is the only major road that runs along the entire east-west length of the Libyan Mediterranean coastline. It is a section in the Cairo–Dakar Highway #1 in the Trans-African Highway system of the African Union, Arab Maghreb Union and others.
Italy–Libya relations refers to the bilateral relations between the State of Libya and the Italian Republic. Italy has an embassy in Libya's capital, Tripoli, and a general consulate in Benghazi. Libya has an embassy in Italy's capital, Rome, and two general consulates.
Tripoli Province was one of the provinces of Libya under Italian rule. It was established in 1937, with the official name: Commissariato Generale Provinciale di Tripoli. It lasted until 1947.
Misrata Governorate was one of the governorates (muhafazah) of Libya from 1963 to 1983. Its capital was the town of Misrata. Initially in the 1930s was called "Provincia di Misurata" of Italian Libya. It was created out of the eastern part of Tripolitania province.
Opération Harmattan was the French participation in the 2011 military intervention in Libya. It was named for the Harmattan, which are hot dry winds that blow over the Sahara, mostly between November and March. The United States' counterpart to this was Operation Odyssey Dawn, the Canadian counterpart was Operation Mobile and the British counterpart was Operation Ellamy. The no-fly zone was proposed during the Libyan Civil War to prevent government forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi from carrying out air attacks on anti-Gaddafi forces. Several countries prepared to take immediate military action at a conference in Paris on 19 March 2011.
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The following lists events that happened during 2011 in Libya.
The Fourth Shore or Italian North Africa was the name created by Benito Mussolini to refer to the Mediterranean shore of coastal colonial Italian Libya and WWII Italian Tunisia in the fascist era Kingdom of Italy, during the late Italian Colonial Empire period of Libya and the Maghreb.
The expulsion of Italians from Libya took place following 21 July 1970, when the Libyan revolutionary council issued a special law to "regain wealth stolen from the Libyan people by Italian oppressors", as stated by Muammar al-Gaddafi in a speech a few days later. With this law, Italians who had long lived in Libya were required to leave the country by October 1970.
