Italy and Libya Continue Reconciliation Efforts

This article focuses on the relations between Italy and Libya which became an Italian Colony, after it was taken from the defeated Ottoman Empire and awarded to Italy by the Allies after WWI. The colony lasted just 23 years and it was severed because of Italy's opposing the Allies during WWII. (Ethiopia was an Italian Colony a mere 8 years between 1935 and 1943)

But this brief history needs to be considered in the greater context of other European Colonies.

It is pointed out that tens of thousand Libyan "terrorists" were captured and held prisoners. Later 20,000 Italians had their property confiscated and were expelled, so their are claims for "compensation" on both sides.

The gradual Colonization of the greater part of Africa by Britain, France, Portugal, Germany and Belgium starting in the 1870s became a frantic scramble ("Scramble for Africa,") formalized by the The 1885 Berlin Conference, to establish international guidelines for the acquisition of African territory, and institutionalized this "New Imperialism".added almost 9 million square miles (23,000,000 km²) ? one-fifth of the land area of the globe to its overseas colonial possessions.The great self esteem some European states felt at possessing territory many times larger than themselves.

The Europeans possessed attitudes of superiority and a sense of mission. There were significant contrasts in the harshness in which the colonial powers administered their Colonies. The French were able to accept an African as French, if they gave up their African culture and adopted French ways. The British did not accept full equality and disapproved of interracial marriage. The Portuguese were more tolerant than the British concerning mixed marriages, though still viewing full blooded Portuguese as superior.

"The French, the Portuguese, the Germans and the Belgians exercised a highly centralized type of administration called 'direct rule.'" The British sought to rule by identifying local power holders and encouraging or forcing these to administer for the British Empire. This was indirect rule.

King Leopold II of Belgium called his vast private colony the Congo Free State. Effectively this meant those exploiting the area were free of all restraint and answerable only to the Belgian king.The treatment of the Africans under this system was harsh enough to cause the other colonial powers to plead with the Belgian king to exercise some moderating influence. "Belgian colonial rule saw massive transfers of wealth from Zaire [the Belgian Congo] to Belgium. Africans received only limited education.

Italy and Libya

Undoing The Damage

The Economist July 312008 | ROME

What Italy hopes to gain by making amends to a former colony

AFTER years of awkward negotiation, Italy and Libya may be ready to settle the legacy of the short, but harsh, Italian colonial venture in north Africa, which the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini liked to call his country’s “fourth shore”.

On July 24th Saif al-Islam, the influential son of Libya’s leader, Muammar Qaddafi, announced the imminent signing of a deal to compensate Libyans for 32 years of Italian colonial rule. “Billions” (he did not say of what) would be spent on, among other things, a longed-for coastal motorway. Italian diplomats tried hastily to curb expectations, but their caution was brushed aside by the prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, who said he hoped to finalise an accord by the end of August.

Like all former colonial relationships, that between Italy and Libya is delicate yet intimate. Italy is Libya’s biggest trading partner, but its colonial record is still fiercely resented. Tens of thousands of Libyans died in concentration camps set up to stifle a revolt against Italian rule that lasted 23 years. In 1970 Colonel Qaddafi expelled 20,000 Italians, who insist it is they, not Libyans, who deserve compensation. Recently links have been further bedevilled by clandestine migration. Most migrants arriving on Italy’s islands, particularly Lampedusa, leave Libyan ports.

Clamping down on illegal immigration is a priority for Mr Berlusconi, which explains his anxiety to close a deal that escaped the previous centre-left government in November. He has personally handled the talks with the Libyan leader.

Those who cast off from Libya, usually aboard perilously vulnerable inflatable boats, constitute only a small percentage of illegal entrants. But on arrival they make a far bigger impact than those who slip across Italy’s land borders or overstay their visas. Every time a party of wretched Africans is filmed landing ashore, it shows the public that illegal migrants are still coming. Last December Italy’s former government signed a deal with Libya on curbing migration, but Libya has not implemented it. On July 25th Italy declared a national state of emergency in response to a sharp rise in the number of landings on Lampedusa. A deal with Libya could be presented as a big step towards resolving the crisis.

But it would leave at least two questions. One is whether Libya would, or could, stem the flow. It has more than 1,700km of coastline. Italy did a deal with Albania in 1998 that virtually halted clandestine migration. But that involved deploying Italian law-enforcement agents on the other side of the Adriatic to an extent Libya would be unlikely to countenance.

The other question is whether a deal would be seen by Italians as worth compensating an oil-rich country for. Unlike the British and French, Italians rarely agonise over their colonial past. Criticism of it barely figures in schoolbooks. In 1981 Libyan petrodollars funded a film on the resistance to Italian rule. “Lion of the Desert” had an all-star cast including Anthony Quinn and Oliver Reed. The government imposed a ban, saying it was “damaging” to the army’s honour. Hardly any Italians have seen it since.