By Libya Herald reporters.
Tripoli, 7 August 2017:
Armed men who seized a control room at the Zawia refinery, disrupting production from the Sharara oil field, were persuaded to leave the building early this morning.
The National Oil Corporation (NOC) said the gunmen had demanded a halt to all production. However, the engineers in charge had managed to simply to reduce the flow which resumed when the attackers were agreed to end their protest.
NOC said that the incident was resolved by approaches from Presidency Council (PC) head Faiez Serraj and by elders in the town.
It has not been said if the raid was the fulfilment of the threat to close down the refinery until the PC had negotiated the release from Saudi Arabia of four local militants arrested in Jeddah on suspicion of being involved in the 2014 Tripoli kidnapping of Egyptian diplomats. However, NOC reported Serraj as saying that the PC would not give in to “blackmail” and deploring the involvement of the state oil firm in an issue that had nothing to do with it.
The attack forced the closure of the pipeline that carries refined product to Brega Petroleum and Marketing distribution centre in the capital. NOC said in a statement today that production of aviation fuel and petrol had been affected but that it had immediately activated an emergency plan in collaboration with Brega Marketing to ship fuel supplies to the capital by sea.
At 2am today the gunmen left the control room. It is not known if they were then arrested.
NOC chief Mustafa Sanalla said that private grievances could not be allowed to damage the country. “Libyans are already suffering from a severe economic crisis and deplorable humanitarian conditions. Everyone should be working together conscientiously and patriotically to save the country”.
Sanalla did not say how much production had been lost by the Sharara field’s reduction in output.
