Libya Unanimously Ratifies $100 Billion Turkey Maritime Corridor

Estimates place natural gas reserves worth several hundred billion US dollars beneath the seabed between Turkey and Libya. On Tuesday, Libya's parliament voted unanimously to approve a maritime agreement with Ankara, creating a direct economic corridor across the eastern Mediterranean. The vote reverses a position held by the country's eastern government in 2019, when it opposed the initial pact signed by the western government in Tripoli.

The corridor connects Turkey's southern coast with Libya's northern coast. Recent discoveries of large oil and gas deposits in the area have intensified interest in the zone. Ankara and Tripoli aim to secure joint economic rights to these resources. Turkey's Foreign Ministry welcomed the parliamentary vote, signaling a consolidation of ties with the eastern power structure.

The agreement effectively ignores the presence of Greek islands, including Crete, Karpathos, and Rhodes. Athens claims a comprehensive exclusive economic zone around these territories. In a post on X, Greece's Foreign Ministry stated it firmly rejects the accord with the backing of the European Union. The EU declared the memorandum null and void, arguing it violates the sovereign rights of third states and conflicts with the Law of the Sea.

Kaja Kallas, the EU's high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, reinforced this stance. She wrote on X that the Libyan vote infringes upon the sovereign rights of third states. The core of the dispute rests on competing interpretations of maritime law. Greece relies on Article 121 of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which grants inhabited islands full economic zone rights. Athens cites a 2022 International Court of Justice ruling involving Colombia and Nicaragua to support its demand for fair demarcation based on coastlines and geography.

Turkey contests this interpretation, arguing that the Mediterranean's geography requires special weight. Ankara claims that granting full economic zones to every small Greek island would cut Turkey off from the open sea. As a non-signatory to the convention, Turkey does not accept arbitration by UN tribunals. Legal experts remain divided on how to fairly divide these overlapping maritime claims.

Political dynamics in Libya have shifted since 2019, when civil war was active and Turkey intervened militarily to support the Tripoli government against General Khalifa Hifter's forces in the east. A subsequent rapprochement saw Turkish firms win billions in reconstruction contracts. Turkey's state oil company TPAO is now conducting seismic surveys off the Libyan coast with the National Oil Corporation. Ankara also supplies weapons and training to Hifter's forces, countering Egyptian and Russian influence.

The new corridor threatens the planned EastMed pipeline, which was designed to transport gas from Israel and Cyprus through Greece to the EU. The corridor cuts across the pipeline's intended route. Turkey has argued that any cable or pipeline project on its claimed continental shelf requires its consent. The region risks splitting into two blocs: a Turkey-Libya axis and an EU-supported grouping of Greece, Cyprus, Egypt, and Israel.