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Turkey indications energy cooperation deal with Somalia

Turkey signed an overseas oil and gas cooperation deal with Somalia on Thursday, the Turkish Energy Ministry said, even more reinforcing bilateral ties after agreeing a defence offer last month.

The energy ministry stated the offer, which it described as an inter-governmental arrangement, includes expedition, evaluation, development and production of oil in Somalia's land and sea blocks.

With this agreement, we will carry out joint activities to bring the resources of Somalia to the Somali people. We aim to enhance Turkey's presence in the Horn of Africa with brand-new partnerships in the field of energy, Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on social networks platform X.

Oil and natural gas expedition offshore of Somalia, and it looks more like oil in the meantime, will start very soon in the areas we have actually identified. We will perhaps send our seismic (expedition). vessel there in the first phase, he stated independently in a panel,. without elaborating.

The deal includes transport, circulation, refining,. sales and services operations of oil and other products from. land and sea projects, the ministry also said.

Turkey has actually become a close ally of the Somali federal government. It. has built schools, medical facilities and infrastructure and provided. scholarships for Somalis to study in Turkey.

In 2017, Turkey opened its greatest overseas military base in. Mogadishu. Turkey likewise supplies training to Somali military and. cops.

In February, Turkey signed a defence and economic. cooperation contract with Somalia and will supply maritime. security assistance to help the African country defend its. territorial waters.

Albayrak stated Turkey was also interested in oil and gas. expedition with Libya. In 2022, Ankara signed an offer comparable to. Thursday's accord with Somalia with Libya's. internationally-recognised government in Tripoli.

We are interested in overseas Libya, our interest in some. areas on land continues. But Somalia is an expedition operation. that we are especially thinking about on the sea, he included.

(source: Reuters)