Libya’s Sanallah calls for external help

The NOC chief wants assistance to get the country exporting oil again

Libya’s oil chief Mustafa Sanallah is calling for Western powers to intervene to end a blockade of oil ports by eastern general Khalifa Haftar that has cost $560mn in lost export revenue. But his appeal has been met with silence, with division between various stakeholders.  Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) ordered the shutdown of five ports serving the Sirte Basin, home to two thirds of production, on 17 January, and pro-Haftar forces closed key south-western oil fields, Sharara and El Feel, two days later.  Sanallah, chairman of the National Oil Corporation (NOC), says production, which had averaged 1.1mn bl/d, will fall to 72,000bl/d by early February.  Haftar ordered the shutdown in pr