Erdogan Pushes To Seize Libyan Oil Patch, Seeing Prospect of Shared Economic Zone
Libya has become the key to President Reccep Erdogan’s plans to carve-up the Eastern Mediterranean into economic zones that would greatly favour Turkey and secure it greater access to oil and gas reserves. The Libyan Prime Minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, head of the Government of National Accord in Tripoli, has signed up to the Turkish proposal for economic zones in the Eastern Mediterranean and a shared economic zone proposed by Ankara. It appears to have been part of the price of Turkish support, upon which the Government of National Accord critically depends. But the realization of the plan first of all requires the capture of the Libyan oil patch in the Sirte basin and the defeat of the Libyan National Army of Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar.
The firing-shot in the battle for the Sirte basin oil patch began with an attack on the city of Sirte on 12 June. The move prompted the Russian leadership backing Haftar to seek a summit with Erdogan, but that was called off on 14 June at the last minute and Erdogan and the Turkish AKP leadership are saying it is merely postponed. In the meantime, the Turks are doing what they can to aid the Libyan army to consolidate in the area, and the Libyan Interior Minister in Tripoli, Fathi Bashagha, has said that the Government of National Accord will only engage in talks once Sirte and the airbase to the south of the city at Jalo has been captured. The Russian and Egyptians sought a ceasefire on Monday, 15 June, but this was ignored by the GNA and Turkey.
Very little oil is currently being produced from Eastern Libya and the export volumes for the country – around 58,000 b/d in March – comprise of Es-Sharira crude from the Fezzan further to the West and are under GNA control. This said, there remain huge reserves in the Sirte basin and there is still substantial infrastructure along the coast at Ras Lanuf and Mersa Brega.
The proposed Turkish plan for economic zones in the Eastern Mediterranean consigns the waters off the coast of Eastern Libya to a shared Libyan-Turkish area combining their proposed exclusive economic zones. If Haftar is defeated, the pursuit of this plan will likely advance the wider plan for enlarged Turkish exclusive economic zones – zones that have serious consequences for Greece and Cyprus as Turkey arrogates waters at their expense for economic exploitation. Indeed, the plan ignores the location of Cyprus and the positions of Greek islands including Rhodes, Karpathos and Crete, just leaving Cyprus with coastal waters. Right now, strong objections to the plan are being voiced by the governments of Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and even Syria; and indeed by France; and last week the government of Eastern Libya asked Israel to join a counter-proposal with Greece, Cyprus and Egypt, aware that the shared Libyan-Turkish area could only go ahead as drafted if the interests of Greece are compromised.
The AKP government has been working on the plan for economic zones since around 2010 following Cyprus’ agreement to delimit its economic zone with Egypt in 2003, with Lebanon in 2007 and Israel in 2010. The Turkish plan leaves no room for any Cypriot economic zone, just allowing the island territorial waters; and it looks, in part, that the plan concerning Cyprus was conceived to wreck the proposed EastMed gas pipeline linking Israel, Cyprus and Greece, bypassing Turkey.
At present, the Turkish agreement on maritime boundaries with Libya has the status of a memorandum of understanding. Signed by Sarraj in late 2019, it has not been ratified by the parliament in Tripoli. The US stance is to encourage all the parties to negotiate a compromise, but such an outcome would only be possible if Erdogan retracted some of his demands and US policymakers, meanwhile, are giving contradictory signals.
