TRIPOLI —
Libya’s National Oil Corporation (NOC) said Wednesday it was lifting the force
majeure at two eastern export terminals, three months into a blockade triggered
by the country’s latest political crisis.
اضافة اعلان
“The NOC announces the lifting of the force
majeure at the Briga and Zweitina terminals, and the Ebla tanker is en route to
load a cargo of condensates,” the NOC said in a statement.
Force majeure is a legal measure allowing
companies to free themselves from contractual obligations in light of
circumstances beyond their control.
The NOC, vital to oil-rich Libya’s economy,
has repeatedly resorted to the mechanism amid blockades of oil installations
throughout the years of violence and political upheaval following the
NATO-backed revolt that toppled and killed dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
Its latest such move had been in late June,
when the NOC said Libya had foregone some $3.5 billion due to a blockade of
eastern oil facilities since mid-April.
That followed the eastern-based parliament’s
appointment in February of a new government to rival the Tripoli-based
administration of Abdulhamid Dbeibah, who has refused to leave office before
elections.
The blockade on the oil facilities was
enforced by groups demanding Dbeibah’s departure and a handover to the rival
administration of Fathi Bashagha, a former interior minister backed by military
strongman Khalifa Haftar.
Bashagha insisted in an interview with AFP
last week that there was “no link” between the blockade and power cuts in the
east, which have lasted up to 18 hours a day amid soaring summer temperatures.
The electricity outages sparked angry
protests across the country in early June.
In Wednesday’s statement, NOC chief Mustafa Sanalla said
that “in recent days, communication has been ongoing with the Oil Facilities
Guard and the head of parliament’s energy committee, negotiations that
confirmed the importance of resuming exports in order to resolve the gas
shortage crisis”.
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