Libyan Communist Party

Libyan Communist Party
Founded	1945
Dissolved	1952
Newspaper	Corriere del Lunedì
Ideology	Communism Marxism–Leninism
Political position	Far-left
Politics of Libya Political parties Elections

The Libyan Communist Party (Italian: Partito Comunista Libico, PCL; Arabic: حزب الشيوعي الليبي) was a Marxist–Leninist communist party in Libya.

Historically, Marxism came to Libya through bourgeois intellectuals who studied abroad and through Marxists that settled from Italy.^[1]

The party was established shortly after World War II, but the Libyan authorities began a crackdown on the party soon after the founding of the Communist Party in 1945. In November 1951, seven of its leaders were forced into exile including Nino Caruso [it] and Valentino Parlato [it], and the Communist Party was under police surveillance.^[2][3] The party's headquarters was in Benghazi. The influence of the party was limited to a small group in Cyrenaica.

Communist militants took part in student demonstrations.^[1] In 1952 the government banned all political parties, forcing the party underground.^[4] A second wave of repression came with Gaddafi coming to power in 1969 and a subsequent wave of repression against communists.^[5][6] In 1973, during the Libyan cultural revolution, Gaddafi stated:

We must purge all the sick people who talk of Communism, atheism, who make propaganda for the Western countries and advocate capitalism. We shall put them in prison.^[7]

References

1. Omeish, Ibrahim (2009). "Political history and future of civil society in Libya" (in Arabic). Libya Almostakbal.
2. Simons, Geoff (1993). "Libya: the struggle for survival". Londres: Macmillan. p. 161. ISBN 0-312-08997-X.
3. One way ticket to Italy - Six Italians deported, in Sunday Ghibli - Settimanale di informazione inglese in Libia, Nov. 1951
4. "The Libyan economy: economic diversification and international repositioning", p. 16.
5. "Northern Communists". 2014-10-28. Archived from the original on 2014-10-28. Retrieved 2023-01-23.
6. "Factbox: Gaddafi rule marked by abuses, rights groups say". Reuters. 2011-02-22. Retrieved 2023-01-23.
7. Times, Henry Tanner Special to The New York (1973-05-22). "Tough Libyan 'Cultural Revolution' Stresses Merger With Egypt". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-01-23.