Libya's eastern administration said it was suspending oil production and exports at the fields and terminals it controls, escalating a dispute with the UN-recognised government in Tripoli over the country's central bank. The move threatens a sector that accounts for most of Libya's export earnings and highlights how power struggles continue to reverberate through the energy system.
The Benghazi-based administration said it was shutting down facilities under its authority until further notice and invoked force majeure. The territory affected accounts for roughly 90 percent of Libya's oil fields and terminals, giving the announcement immediate economic weight even before the full operational impact is known.
The eastern authorities linked the decision to what they called repeated attacks on the leaders, employees and administrations of the Central Bank in Tripoli. They accused unnamed groups aligned with the capital of trying to seize control of the country's most important financial institution. The central bank sits at the center of Libya's oil revenues and state budgeting, so any fight over its leadership quickly becomes a fight over who controls the cash flow.
The country remains split between rival centers of power. Tripoli is controlled by the UN-recognised government led by Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah, while the east is backed by military commander Khalifa Haftar. Oil is often produced in the east, but the income is managed through the capital. That mismatch has repeatedly made energy production a political lever.
The move followed a run of tensions around the central bank. The bank had briefly suspended all operations after the abduction of its head of information technology, then resumed. Local media also reported that armed men had besieged the bank to force the resignation of governor Seddik al-Kabir. Later reports said a commission linked to the presidential council had installed a new board, though analysts questioned whether it would have real authority.
Those questions matter because the dispute is not just about who sits in an office. It is about whether any side can actually issue letters of credit, allocate salaries or finance public works. Experts quoted in the supplied evidence said the physical takeover of the bank would not necessarily translate into control over the purse strings.
The United Nations had already warned about a rapid deterioration in Libya's economic and security situation, saying unilateral moves had deepened tensions. The oil shutdown fits that pattern. It is a reminder that Libya's recovery from the 2011 uprising remains trapped by institutions that are nominally national but practically divided.
The suspension also raises the risk that the latest contest over the central bank could feed broader instability. For Libya, oil is both the country's chief source of revenue and one of its most powerful political weapons. When the two sides of the state use that weapon against each other, the cost spreads well beyond the oilfields themselves.
