Lebanon, Egypt, Syria sign gas flow deal
ANKARA (AA) – Lebanon, Egypt and Syria signed an agreement for the re-flow of gas from the “Arab Natural Gas” line on Tuesday in Beirut.
Lebanese Energy Minister, Walid Fayyad, Syria’s Deputy Ambassador to Beirut, Ali Abdulkerim Ali, and Egypt’s Ambassador to Beirut, Yasser Allavi, were present at the gas agreement ceremony held at the Lebanese Ministry of Energy.
Under the agreement, 720 million cubic meters per year will be sent from Egypt to Lebanon.
With Egyptian gas, the Lebanese will get electricity for four more hours a day, Fayyad confirmed.
Currently, due to a deep economic crisis in Lebanon, citizens get state electricity only for four hours a day.
US sanctions
According to Fayyad, parties to the agreement requested that Egypt be exempt from the Caesar Act, which covers US sanctions on the Assad regime in Syria.
Egypt called on the US administration to support the implementation of the agreement.
A meeting was held in the Jordan capital of Amman on Sept. 9 last year when Lebanon, Egypt, Syria and Jordan agreed on the restart of the Egyptian-owned Arab Natural Gas Pipeline as well as gas exports to Lebanon.
However, due to the Caesar Law, which covers US sanctions on the Assad regime in Syria, no concrete progress was made over the past nine months.
Jordan and Egypt have requested written approval from the US that they will not be subjected to sanctions.
Against these concerns, the Lebanese Energy Minister said in December 2021 that the US had given the green light to the implementation of the project.
Amos Hochstein, a senior adviser on energy security at the US State Department, who mediated for the disputed maritime border between Lebanon and Israel, said after arriving in Beirut on June 14 that they would look at the final agreement between Egypt and Lebanon to evaluate the sanctions compliance of the natural gas project.
Arab Gas Pipeline
The third 90-kilometer section of the 1200-kilometer pipeline, costing US$1.2 billion in 2009, passes through Syria.
Testing on gas imports from the Arab Gas Pipeline to Lebanon began in 2009, resulting in temporary supply of gas to the Deir Ammar Power Plant in Tripoli.
However, natural gas supply to Lebanon came to a complete halt following the Arab Spring demonstrations.
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