Libyan Parliament Ratifies Maritime Corridor With Turkey

Libyan lawmakers voted unanimously on Tuesday to formalize a maritime agreement with Turkey. The measure creates a direct economic corridor linking the southern coast of Turkey with the northern coast of Libya. This route grants both nations shared rights to exploit undersea resources in the eastern Mediterranean.

The deal targets a specific stretch of water where recent surveys identified large deposits of oil and natural gas. Estimates place the value of the gas reserves under the seabed at several hundred billion US dollars. Ankara and Tripoli intend to secure their respective economic rights to these assets and develop them jointly.

The ratification reverses a position held for seven years. In 2019, the rival government in eastern Libya opposed the initial corridor agreement signed by the UN-recognized Government of National Accord in the west. The eastern parliament now supports the pact, a move welcomed by Turkey's Foreign Ministry. The shift follows a period of improved relations between Ankara and the eastern leadership.

Greece reacted with sharp opposition to the vote. Athens maintains that it holds a comprehensive exclusive economic zone around its islands, including Crete, Karpathos, and Rhodes. The planned corridor ignores the presence of these islands. Greece's Foreign Ministry stated on X that it firmly rejects the accord with the backing of the European Union. The EU has declared the memorandum null and void because it violates the sovereign rights of third states and conflicts with the Law of the Sea.

Kaja Kallas, the EU high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, reinforced that stance. She wrote on X that the Libyan vote infringes upon the sovereign rights of third states. Her comments align with the broader European position that the new boundary cuts through established maritime zones.

The legal dispute centers on the interpretation of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Greece relies on Article 121, which grants inhabited islands that support an economic life the same maritime rights as mainland territory. Athens points to a 2022 ruling by the International Court of Justice in a case involving Colombia and Nicaragua. That decision held that overlapping maritime interests require a fair demarcation that weighs coastlines and geography.

Turkey argues that Mediterranean geography requires special consideration. Ankara claims that granting full exclusive economic zones to every small Greek island near its coast would cut Turkey off from the open sea. Turkey has never signed the convention and does not accept arbitration by a UN tribunal. Legal experts remain divided on what constitutes a fair division in this specific region.

Political dynamics in Libya have shifted since 2019, when civil war forced a military intervention by Turkey to support the Tripoli government against an offensive by eastern General Khalifa Hifter. Since then, Ankara has pursued a rapprochement with Hifter's camp. Turkish firms have won reconstruction contracts worth billions of dollars, and the state oil company TPAO is collaborating with Libya's National Oil Corporation on seismic surveys. Turkey also supplies weapons and training to Hifter's forces, countering Egyptian and Russian influence in the east.

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