Libya's eastern government says all oilfields to close

Reuters ^ | 8/26/24

[EBH]

BENGHAZI, Aug 26 (Reuters) - Oilfields in eastern Libya that account for almost all the country's production will be closed and production and exports halted, the eastern-based administration said on Monday, after a flare-up in tension over the leadership of the central bank.

There was no confirmation from the country's internationally recognised government in Tripoli or from the National Oil Corp (NOC), which controls the country's oil resources.

NOC subsidiary Waha Oil Company, however, said it planned to gradually reduce output and warned of a complete halt to Libya's production, citing unspecified "protests and pressures". Another subsidiary Sirte Oil Company also said it would cut output, calling on authorities to "intervene to maintain production levels".

Nearly all of Libya's oilfields are in the east, which is under the control of Khalifa Haftar who leads the Libyan National Army (LNA).

[who_would_fardels_bear]

Thank you Hillary, Neocons, and the Deep State. You care so much more about people of color that you bombed their country into a slave market and launch point for mass migration.

[rrrod]

My first overseas job was in that part of Libya. Early 70s I’m sure it’s still a Shiite hole.

[Bookshelf]

EASTERN OIL (Cyrenaica) WILL SURVIVE
Campaign in Cyrenaica Brings Libya’s Oil Industry to a Halt
Publication: Terrorism Monitor Volume: By: Andrew McGregor
October 31, 2013.
Libya’s crude oil exports have fallen to less than 250,000 barrels per day. Even as Libya descended into post-revolution political chaos, its vital oil industry made a rapid and surprising recovery, aided partly by the reluctance of both sides in the revolutionary struggle to damage or destroy the nation’s energy infrastructure. Today, however, Libya’s oil industry is largely paralyzed as it falls prey to post-revolution political maneuvering, especially in Libya’s eastern region of Cyrenaica. In September, production fell to 300,000 barrels per day, the lowest output since the 2011 anti-Qaddafi revolution.
A strike by armed guards in the oil fields developed into a general blockade of large parts of Libya’s oil facilities
... In Cyrenaica, the original economic causes of the strikes have been joined by new demands for an autonomous Cyrenaica within a federal Libya. (Libya’s capital, Tripoli, located in western Libya, has experienced power blackouts and water cuts al-Sharq al-Awsat, October 7).
There has been talk of establishing an autonomous Cyrenaica since the overthrow of former president Mu’ammar Qaddafi, with much of the discussion revolving around the role of the tribally-based Cyrenaica Transitional Council (CTC) and its titular leader, Ahmad Zubayr al-Sanusi, a great-nephew of King Idris al-Sanusi who served 31 years in the regime’s worst prisons after failing to overthrow the young Colonel Qaddafi in a 1970 plot. Official neglect of Cyrenaica dates from the early years of Mu’ammar Qaddafi’s rule, when he survived several plots organized by royalists and other factions from Cyrenaica. ...
The newly declared autonomous state, to be known by its Arabic name, Barqa, corresponds to the old state of Cyrenaica, constituting the eastern half of Libya at the time of its independence in 1951.
Ibrahim al-Jadhran, a 33-year-old who makes his headquarters in Ajdabiya, is reported to have spent seven years in Qaddafi’s notorious Abu Salim prison before becoming a successful battalion commander in Cyrenaica during the revolution. Al-Jadhran’s reward was to be appointed chief of the Petroleum Facilities Guards (PFG) in eastern Libya, a powerful and potentially lucrative post. The PFG is overseen by Libya’s Defense Ministry but funded by the Oil Ministry. ...
On October 2, the secessionists announced the appointment of Abd Rabo Abd al-Hamid al-Barasi as the head of the executive bureau, to be located in al-Bayda, as well as the appointment of Colonel Najib Sulayman al-Hasi as commander-in-chief of a projected 20,000-man Barqa defense force (drawn largely from the 17,000 petroleum guards and militia members that have joined them), based in the town of Brega. The force will be tasked with the protection of Cyrenaican oil facilities and securing the cities of Derna and Benghazi in order to halt the ongoing bombing and assassination campaigns. ... Officials of the self-proclaimed government have maintained that the move to establish a new administration in Cyrenaica is not an effort to take sole control of the majority of Libya’s oil resources. According to Abd Rabo al-Barasi: “We only want Barqa’s share according to the 1951 constitution” (Libya Herald, October 25). Elsewhere, al-Barasi has said: “The aim of the regional government is to share resources in a better fashion, and to end the centralized system adopted by the authorities in Tripoli” (Arab News, October 25). ...
There is a tribal dimension to the dispute between al-Jadhran and the GNC; al-Jadhran and his brother Salim are both members of the Magharba tribe, a large and influential group that occupies the most productive oil fields in Cyrenaica. The GNC worries about alienating the entire tribe if it takes firm measures with al-Jadhran (Bloomberg, October 1). PFG commander Bukhamada also cites a challenge to national unity inherent in any attempt to dislodge the rebellious guard leader: “On a purely military level, of course the Ministry of Defence could easily defeat Jathran’s men, but politically the situation is very difficult. If troops are sent in from the west, that would only help to further unite the tribes of the east against the government” (Petroleum Economist, October 8). In some cases, secessionists and other Cyrenaican opponents of the central government in Tripoli have exploited the fear of civil war to warn against government-sponsored military operations to reclaim the oil fields of the east. Al-Jadhran and others also like to characterize the Tripoli government as being controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood to discredit their efforts to regain control of the east (Reuters, October 27; Petroleum Economist, October 8). Local Islamists in Benghazi, in turn, regard al-Jadhran as a tribalist who is pulling Libya backwards in order to strengthen the Magharba (Reuters, October 27).

[rrrod]

Interesting. Thanks.
Last time I was in Libya was in the 80s and was working 28/28 and living in Malta.

[Mouton]

Gone is OASIS.

[11th_VA]

So likely, gas prices will be going up, before the election - very unfortunate