Baakleen National Library occupies a historic building that goes back to 1897, known then as "Baakleen Saray", comprising a court, a prison, and a post of the gendarmerie.

Founded Upon the initiative of MP Walid Jumblatt in 1987, the building was restored and furnished to assume the role of a public library, which was equipped with various volumes, reference books, periodicals, and necessary equipment and run by a well trained and experienced staff. Moreover, upon his request, the library was annexed to the Ministry of Culture under the Council of Ministers decision No. 44, dated 9/10/1996, and thus became a public establishment.

- To meet the needs of scholars.

- To stimulate and develop the cultural movement.

- To contribute to social awareness.

Authorized by decision Number 363, and includes elites concerned with public affairs, supporting the library financially and morally.

The youth Library is supervised by a highly qualified team. Smartly and colorfully decorated, it contains books and stories fit for all early ages in Arabic, English and French. Of course, its possessions are regularly enriched by new acquisitions purchased or donated. It is highly popular among the children and receives a good lot of visitors, individually or through private and official school tours.

Since this Library’s visitors are almost exclusively students, it is obvious that our acquisition policy is mainly directed by the Ministry of Education’s curriculum. Besides, the Library endeavors to multiply and develop the sources of knowledge in books and audiovisual means, to the highest limits of its available yearly budget. Recently, the Library has added a computer facility to the former video, television and sound equipments in order to benefit from the CD Rom sources of information, and to link this Library to the general Library’s network.

The Library is projecting to computerize the index and to add more computers at the disposition of our teenagers in order to familiarize the children with computer operations.

An area equipped with references about children, their raising and their psychology specially creates for the mothers who accompany their children to the Library.

The Library’s summer activities
In summer, the children Library’s schedule is different, the Library management prepares special constructive programs along with knowledge contests, drawing coloring etc. All aiming at improving and encouraging the thinking power of the child and at teaching him to depend and trust himself: a factor that is behind all creative abilities.

The Association plays a specific and effective role in backing the National Library, it complements the role of the Culture Ministry .It is a legal and official institution, whose basic internal regulations have strictly defined its mission, and strictly respects the coordination and harmony between its management and the Culture Ministry through its direct relation with library’s Director (designated by the Ministry), who (the Director) suggests the plans and projects to develop the library and secure the adequate conditions and means aiming at allowing it to accomplish its mission and allow its visitors to employ the references sources, equipments, of the visitors and the library’s development as a cultural social and multi means center.

This Cultural project (the National Library) have been under the tutelage of the Lebanese government, specifically the Cultural Ministry since 1996, when it was added to the other ministry’s institutions that created an important new opportunity for the Library to realize objective in raising public awareness and to encourage and back up any creative activity as well as safeguarding the national heritage. And above all, to implement the planning of the general cultural orientation of the Lebanese state towards modernizing the cultural policy by ridding it from the crippling bureaucracy.

It is evident that the Culture Ministry, whatever its annual budget and possibilities may be, Baakleen cannot cope alone with the covering of the Cultural tasks’ expenses more specifically the Baakleen National Library. This created the need for such an association and its role as we formerly mentioned. The association is the legal took officially licensed by the interior Ministry attestation N’ 363/Hd of September 30, 1993. The Association is composed of the group of Lebanese ladies and gentlemen personalities, well known in the fields of science society, culture and educations, who dedicated voluntarily a great part of their time and effort to help the Library’s management in the task of its development and enrichment.