ROME (ITALPRESS) – A group of men closed the El Sharara oil field in southwestern Libya during the night. This was announced to Italpress by Bashir Al-Sheikh, head of the Fezzan Movement. “A group that has not yet announced itself” closed the oil field after receiving the order to close the field. It is an important field for Libya whose production reaches 350,000 barrels per day.
It is not the first time that the field has been closed, as groups of protesters closed the El Sharara field earlier this year, demanding the improvement of their living conditions, the construction of a refinery in the south, the maintenance of crumbling roads and an end to fuel shortages in southern Libya, before resuming production two weeks later on 21 January.
According to Al-Sheikh, however, this time it was not his movement that was behind the closure of the site but Saddam Haftar, son of General Khalifa Haftar, who gave instructions by phone to close the Sharara camp because it was managed by Spanish oil company “Repsol”. “Saddam gave immediate instructions by telephone and without the use of military force to shut down the site in response to the attempt to arrest him last Friday in Italy, on the basis of an arrest warrant issued against him in Spain. None of our militants have participated in the closure of the El Sharara field, managed by the Spanish company Repsol, and no one can talk about it. I have nothing to do with the closure of the field and I refuse to be accused of this.”
According to this source, Saddam Haftar was in Rome last Friday and upon his return to Benghazi he was stopped for an hour by the Italian authorities as an arrest warrant from the Spanish authorities was issued against him. Saddam Haftar would therefore have been informed of the arrest warrant issued against him during his return to Libya from the Italian capital. The warrant is said to be in light of his involvement in the smuggling of a shipment of weapons blocked by Spanish police several months ago. The same sources stated that Western and Libyan attempts are underway to pressure Spain to revoke the arrest warrant issued against Saddam, with the aim of resuming work in the Sharara oil field, which is one of the most important oil fields in Libya. This was also confirmed to Italpress from journalistic sources in Tripoli and Benghazi even if at the moment there is no official confirmation from Haftar’s General Command based in Rajma.
Last summer, Saddam Haftar threatened to close the El Sharara site after Spanish police confiscated military equipment and weapons that were headed to the Emirates and then toeastern Libya, according to Spanish press reports. At the time, Saddam Haftar had managed to obtain licenses to transport goods and commercial material from Spain to the Emirates, but the Spanish police discovered that the cargo consisted of weapons and military equipment.
– Photo: Fezzan movement, Bashir Al-Sheikh –
(ITALPRESS).