By Libya Herald reporters.
Tunis, 26 March 2017:
A new attempt to sell Libyan oil cheaply outside of the National Oil Corporation (NOC) has been lambasted by Corporation chairman Mustafa Sanalla.
NOC has today put out a statement saying it knows of illegal offers to sell oil at a huge discount to official selling prices which, if they went through, would cost Libya hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenue.
It gave no details of who is offering the contracts but warned shipping companies and the crude oil market that the contracts were illegal.
“Entering into them may lead to serious legal consequences and financial losses” it cautioned, “NOC does not accept responsibly or liability whatsoever for any loss or damage incurred as the result of entering into contracts with unauthorised individuals.”
NOC insisted that it already had contracts with 16 international companies for the sale of all Libyan crude to be produced this year.
“Only these companies are legally contracted to buy Libyan crude oil and to charter shipping tankers from Libyan ports for 2017.”
It named the buyers as ENI, Total, OMV, Repsol, Rosneft, LukOil, Cepsa, Saras, API, Glencore, Socar, Unipec, Vitol, Gunvor, Petraco, and BB Energy.
NOC insisted that all crude oil exports are paid by documentary letters of credit and at the Official Selling Price (OSP) without any discount.
In April 2016 the parallel eastern NOC was frustrated in an attempt to sell a 650,000 barrel cargo to a UAE buyer. The Indian tanker Distya Ameya loaded at Tobruk but was refused entry to Malta . Meanwhile the UN added it by name to its sanctions list, meaning that it could take the oil to no other port anywhere in the world. It later sailed to Zawia where its cargo was unloaded.
This article has been updated to include the previous attempt to sell oil outside of NOC
