Libya scrambles to protect output recovery

The Tripoli administration moves against its own central bank to try to prevent another blockade

Crisis-torn Libya has taken the unprecedented step of denying its own central bank access to oil income. The move seeks to safeguard the country’s faster-than-expected oil production recovery amid concerns that eastern general Khalifa Haftar will re-impose an oil-targeted blockade. Haftar, whose Libyan National Army controls the bulk of oil facilities, lifted eight-month restrictions on fields and ports—that had depressed output to c.90,000bl/d—in late September on condition that a new commission is formed to decide how oil revenues are spent. Since then, output has ramped up faster than most analysts predicted, returning this month to its pre-blockade level of 1.2mn bl/d. But that progress