Cyrenaica Independent?

From the National Post, a Canadian Newspaper:

TRIPOLI — Civic leaders from Libya’s eastern Cyrenaica province will on Tuesday launch a push for regional autonomy, posing a new challenge to the country’s fragile cohesion after the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi.

Five thousand people are due to attend an inaugural “Congress of the People of Cyrenaica” near the eastern city of Benghazi where they will set out a proposal for Libya to be transformed into a federal state, one of the organizers said.


“We would like in Cyrenaica to take care of housing, education and other things and would delegate national security, defence … to the central government,” said Mohammed Buisier, a Libyan-American who is helping organize the congress.

“We believe in one Libya,” he told Reuters by telephone from Benghazi, cradle of the revolution against Gaddafi last year.

“People in Cyrenaica have for 40 years suffered from negligence … If we keep this negligence towards the east, I cannot guarantee that Libya will be united in 25 years time.”