Turkey moved closer to expanding energy exploration in the eastern Mediterranean after the second of Libya’s two governments endorsed maritime boundaries disputed by European Union members Greece and Cyprus.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry said the Tuesday ratification by Libya’s eastern administration in Benghazi of a deal to delimit maritime jurisdictions protects Ankara’s rights and will deepen bilateral cooperation. The rival Libyan government in the western capital, Tripoli, has close ties with Turkey and has already backed the deal.
Approval from Benghazi strengthens Ankara’s maritime claims in contested waters and could pave the way for Turkish ships to explore for oil and gas east of Crete, which is situated between Turkey and Libya. It could also inflame Turkey’s tensions with Greece and Cyprus, which assert competing rights over much of the same territory.
Libya is also in conflict with Greece over offshore-exploration licenses issued by Athens for waters south of Crete.
“This agreement infringes upon the sovereign rights of third states, it does not comply with the Law of the Sea, and is null and void,” Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission – the EU’s executive arm – said in a statement on X late Tuesday. “We reaffirm our solidarity with Greece and Cyprus.”
Greece’s foreign ministry rejected the ratification as well as the “illegal” delimination within the agreement, which it says disregards the Greek islands and their entitlement to maritime zones. It added that Turkey and Libya have no lawful basis for establishing maritime boundaries because any exclusive economic zones they could claim would not overlap.
Although maritime boundaries in the eastern Mediterranean have long been disputed, Turkey can now say that all of Libya supports its claims, Anas El Gomati, founder of the Tripoli-based Sadeq Institute think tank, said on X.
He added that it may cause Ankara to assert itself more forcefully, potentially complicating plans for cables and pipelines linking Cyprus and Greece to Europe. “Investors and insurers will have to price that risk in for vessels,” Gomati said.
The development also has political implications for the region, which is seeing “the emergence of two increasingly competitive geopolitical blocks – one led by Turkey, the other by Israel – extending from the Eastern Mediterranean into the wider Middle East,” Brookings Institution fellow Asli Aydintasbas said on X.Extending its influence across all of Libya “strengthens Turkey’s position at a time when the Israel-Greece-Cyprus energy and defense alignment is deepening,” she added