Turkiye ‘interested’ in Libya's offer for offshore exploration, says energy minister

Turkiye is interested in an offer from Libya to carry out offshore energy exploration, Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on Wednesday, Reuters has reported.

“Libya has offered to us to work with our exploration vessels offshore,” he told the state-owned Anadolu news agency. “Frankly, we are keen on this offer.”

In 2020, NATO member Turkiye sent military personnel to Libya to train and support a Tripoli-based government against General Khalifa Haftar’s forces, the Libyan National Army, based in the east of Libya. Later that year, it agreed with Tripoli a maritime demarcation accord, which was disputed by Egypt and Greece. In 2022, Ankara and Tripoli also signed a preliminary accord on energy exploration, which, again, Egypt and Greece oppose.

Bayraktar added that Turkiye was also interested in other projects in Libya and needed the “right project and partner.”

Turkiye has been at odds with fellow NATO member Greece over maritime jurisdiction in the eastern Mediterranean. Disputes over hydrocarbon exploration strained ties between Ankara, Greece and the European Union, although relations have improved in recent years as tensions have eased.

Bayraktar also said that Turkiye was interested in gas fields off Egypt, with which Turkiye has recently begun mending ties after a decade of animosity. The two countries are working on a project regarding Cairo’s gas procurement that involves Turkish floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) ships, he explained.

The minister also said that Ankara aimed to send its Oruc Reis exploration vessel to Somalia by October to work there as part of a hydrocarbon cooperation deal between the countries.

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