Factbox: Libya

7 Jul 2012, 5:54 pm   -   Source: AFP
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Basic facts about Libya, which is voting for a national assembly on Saturday.

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Basic facts about Libya, which is voting for a national assembly on Saturday.
  
GEOGRAPHY: Libya is bordered by the Mediterranean to the north, Egypt to the east and Tunisia and Algeria to the west. To the south are Niger, Chad and Sudan. About 93 percent of its land is desert.
  
AREA: At 1,760,000 square kilometres (710,200 square miles), Libya is Africa's fourth largest country.
  
POPULATION: About 6.3 million before the 2011 uprising. However that included some 1.5 million African immigrants, many of whom fled during the fighting.
  
CAPITAL: Tripoli
  
OFFICIAL LANGUAGE: Arabic
  
RELIGION: Islam 97 percent (almost entirely Sunni), Christianity three percent.
  
HISTORY: Coastal areas were settled successively by Phoenician traders, Romans and Byzantines before the region became part of successive Islamic empires from the seventh century AD.
  
In the early 20th century, the country was seized from the Ottomans by Italy, which gave it its modern name and ruled it with considerable violence until World War II, when its deserts saw some epic tank battles.
  
Libya became independent in 1951 with King Mohammed Idriss al-Senussi as head of state. Idriss was overthrown by Colonel Moamer Kadhafi in a bloodless coup on September 1, 1969.
  
Through much of the 1980s and 1990s, Libya was considered a pariah state by the West, and its capital was bombed by US aircraft in 1986 in retaliation for alleged support for terrorism.
  
The country was subjected to UN and US trade embargoes, which were lifted in 2003 and 2004 respectively.
  
February, 2011 saw the start of an uprising which turned into an armed conflict. On March 19, British, French and US forces launched UN-backed air attacks with NATO taking over on March 31.
  
On October 20, 2011, the capture and killing of Kadhafi by the rebels effectively sealed the latter's victory.
  
The Benghazi-based National Transitional Council was the political motor of the rebellion.
  
The NTC has been the de facto ruling body since Kadhafi's fall, although regional militias play a major role.
  
ECONOMY: Oil was discovered in 1959 and is Libya's main natural resource, with a pre-revolt output capacity of about 1.6 million barrels per day, accounting for more than 95 percent of exports and 75 percent of the budget. After total paralysis in the uprising, oil activity has progressively resumed.
  
Oil reserves are estimated at 44 billion barrels; Libya also has substantial amounts of natural gas.
  
GDP: $80.9 billion in 2010; estimated to have fallen to 37.4 billion dollars in 2011.
  
GDP per capita: 12,300 dollars in 2010; estimated at 5,800 in 2011. (Source: World Bank).
  
CURRENCY: Libyan dinar
  
DEFENCE: The armed forces are being refashioned. During Kadhafi's regime it boasted 76,000 men, including 50,000 in the army, in addition to 40,000 volunteers in the popular guards, according to an International Institute for Strategic Studies issued in 2010.
  
Since Kadhafi's fall, the authorities have struggled to build a new army, while militias of former rebels have tapped into the vast arsenal of the old regime and continue to take the law and security into their own hands.
  

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