Tripoli as a capital

Tripoli is Libya's largest city and port, and is the country's capital. Meeting-place of the People's Congress and full-time residence of Colonel Qaddafi, it is known in Arabic as Tarabalus Al-Gharb, or Tripoli of the West.

Plans are mooted for a new capital to be sited on the coast of the Gulf of Sirte. Siting the capital on this neutral territory would remove it from both the two rival provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, and may thus serve as a point of unity between them. Colonel Qaddafi's close family links with the Sirt area may add to the final acceptance of this proposal, but it is, as yet, only in the planning stages in government circles.