Editing History of Libya (section)

==Kingdom==
{{main|Kingdom of Libya}}
[[File:King Idris I of Libya 1960's.jpg|thumb|King Idris I announced Libya's independence on 24 December 1951, and was King until the 1969 coup that overthrew his government.]]
On 21 November 1949, the [[United Nations General Assembly|UN General Assembly]] passed a resolution stating that Libya should become independent before 1 January 1952. Idris represented Libya in the subsequent UN negotiations. On 24 December 1951, Libya declared its independence as the [[Kingdom of Libya|United Kingdom of Libya]], a constitutional and hereditary monarchy under King [[Idris of Libya|Idris]], Libya's only monarch.

1951 also saw the enactment of the [[Constitution of Libya (1951)|first Libyan Constitution]]. The Libyan National Assembly drafted the Constitution and passed a resolution accepting it in a meeting held in the city of Benghazi on Sunday, 6th Muharram, [[Hijri year|Hegiras]] 1371: 7 October 1951. [[Mohamed Abulas’ad El-Alem]], President of the National Assembly and the two vice-presidents of the National Assembly, [[Omar Faiek Shennib]] and Abu Baker Ahmed Abu Baker executed and submitted the Constitution to [[King Idris]] following which it was published in the Official Gazette of Libya.<ref>Chronology of International Events and Documents, Royal Institute of International Affairs. Vol. 7, No. 8 (5–18 April 1951), pp. 213–244</ref>

The enactment of the Libyan Constitution was significant in that it was the first piece of legislation to formally entrench the rights of Libyan citizens following the post-war creation of the Libyan nation state. Following on from the intense UN debates during which Idris had argued that the creation of a single Libyan state would be of benefit to the regions of Tripolitania, Fezzan, and Cyrenaica, the Libyan government was keen to formulate a constitution which contained many of the entrenched rights common to European and North American nation states. Though not creating a secular state – Article 5 proclaims Islam the religion of the State – the Libyan Constitution did formally set out rights such as equality before the law as well as equal civil and political rights, equal opportunities, and an equal responsibility for public duties and obligations, "without distinction of religion, belief, race, language, wealth, kinship or political or social opinions" (Article 11).

During this period, Britain was involved in extensive engineering projects in Libya and was also the country's biggest supplier of arms. The United States also maintained the large [[Wheelus Air Base]] in Libya.<ref>{{cite web |author=Holger Terp |url=http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/ordbog/lord/l170.htm |title=Fredsakademiet: Freds- og sikkerhedspolitisk Leksikon L 170 : Libya During the Cold War |publisher=Fredsakademiet.dk |access-date=2012-12-23 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121231090551/http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/ordbog/lord/l170.htm |archive-date=31 December 2012 |url-status=live }}</ref>