Libya’s acting Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni said the government had reached a deal with a rebel leader controlling oil ports to hand over the last two terminals and end a blockade that crippled the OPEC nation’s petroleum industry.
“We have successfully reached an agreement to solve the oil crisis. We have received today Ras Lanuf and Es Sider oil ports thankfully without the use of force,” Thinni said at Ras Lanuf terminal in eastern Libya. “I officially declare this is the end of the oil crisis.” Thinni said the ports had been reclaimed after an agreement with Ibrahim Jathran, whose fighters had seized the terminals almost a year ago to demand more regional autonomy.
Jathran told reporters that he had handed over the ports as a “goodwill gesture” to the new parliament, which was elected last month.
Taking back the two major eastern oil terminals could make around 500,000 more barrels a day of crude available for export, a major breakthrough for the North African state whose coffers have been hit hard by oil revenue losses.
The end of the blockade would also see a final chapter of a crisis that included failed negotiations, threats to bombard rebels and even an attempt by Jathran to dispatch an oil tanker that was later boarded on the high seas by US commandos.
Disputes over Libya’s vast oil resources have been among the many triggers for conflict between rival brigades of former rebels and allied political factions since civil war ended four decades of Muammar Gaddafi’s one-man rule in 2011.
