Chairman of the Libyan National Oil Corporation (NOC), Farhat Bengdara, met Saturday with the CEO of the Italian energy company, Eni, Claudio Descalzi, to sign an agreement to develop two gas fields off the western coast of Libya.
This was in the presence of the Libyan outgoing Prime Minister, Abdul Hameed Dbeibeh, and the Italian Prime Minister, Georgia Meloni.
Bengdara had revealed in previous statements that the Italian company had agreed to invest eight billion dollars to develop two gas fields, while the Oil Minister of Dbeibeh’s government, Mohamed Aoun, rejected this agreement.
Aoun said in statements Saturday that activating the investment agreement in two gas fields in the Mediterranean, Extraction A and Extraction B, to produce 850 million cubic feet, is illegal and lacks equality between the Libyan and Italian sides.
The Libyan government, headed by Fathi Bashagha, also rejected this approach, stressing its objection to what it called the mysterious deal between the National Oil Corporation and Eni.
Bashagha’s government affirmed its rejection of the attempt to “revive the dead government” by “involving the Libyans’ wealth in such deals,” deploring “the opportunistic behavior of the Italian government that goes beyond the supreme Libyan interests and risks the good relationship between the two countries.”
Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni visited Tripoli today amid a controversial atmosphere due to the energy deal.