LBY - Human Rights

Human Rights

According to the US Department of State’s annual human rights report for 2007, Libya’s authoritarian regime continued to have a poor record in the area of human rights. Some of the numerous and serious abuses on the part of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya government included poor prison conditions, arbitrary arrest and prisoners held incommunicado, and political prisoners held for many years without charge or trial. The judiciary was controlled by the government, and there was no right to a fair public trial. Libyans under the Jamahiriya were lacking a clear and democratic method to change their government. Freedom of speech, press, assembly, association, and religion were restricted under the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya government. Independent human rights organisations were prohibited. Ethnic and tribal minorities suffered discrimination, and the state continued to restrict the labor rights of imported foreign workers.

In May 2010, Libya was elected by the UN General Assembly to a three-year term on the UN's Human Rights Council. It was subsequently suspended from the Human Rights Council in March 2011.

Libya's human rights record was put in the spotlight in February 2011, due to the Jamahiriya's response to pro-democracy protesters, when it killed hundreds of demonstrators.

In 2011, Freedom House rated both political rights and civil liberties in Libya as "7" (1 representing the most free and 7 the least free rating), and gave it the freedom rating of "Not Free".