Category: Egypt

Egyptian media said Tuesday militants in the Sinai Peninsula bombed a natural gas pipeline in a regional industrial zone, though no injuries were reported. Ahram Online reported unknown assailants blew up the pipeline that supplies regional industries in the city of Arish. The blast was described as powerful, though no other details were provided. Militants in the restive peninsula have targeted the region’s gas infrastructure repeatedly since the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011. The latest attack follows a push by the Egyptian government to address a lingering gas shortage. The Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum expects domestic gas production will increase 1.7 percent this year, though consumption is expected to increase by 12.5 percent. More than a dozen new natural gas wells are expected to be tied into the national grid this year in an effort to increased gas production. A country report from […]

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Abdel Fattah al-Sisi , the army chief acclaimed by Egyptians as saving them from the self-destructively partisan and secretive rule of former president Mohamed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood government in last July’s coup, is coasting towards his coronation in presidential elections next week. Yet, for all the adulation heaped on him, his admirers have had little chance to find out who exactly their putative saviour is and what he stands for – until now. It is not that the former military intelligence chief has been out among his 85m people pressing the flesh. He has not been out campaigning at all. He receives delegations from around the country and grants interviews to selected media outlets, from the penumbra of a well-protected hotel owned by the army, after revealing there have already been two attempts on his life. He emits exhortations, vague pledges and the occasional threatening aside, rather […]

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British energy company BP aims to invest about $1.5 billion in the Egyptian oil and gas sector, the Egyptian government said. State-run media in Egypt said Monday representatives from BP met Prime Minister Ibrahim Mahlab and Oil Minister Sherif Ismal in Cairo to discuss work in the Egyptian energy sector. The government said the delegation welcomed Egyptian efforts to overcome "obstacles facing companies working on the Egyptian market." BP’s counterpart, BG Group, expressed concern about its future operations in Egypt, citing continued diversions of natural gas to the domestic market. No cargoes of liquefied natural gas left Egypt during the first quarter of 2014 and the company said it produced 66,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in Egypt, down 35 percent from fourth quarter 2013. The Egyptian government said BP is investing $1.5 billion in the oil and gas sector during the second half […]

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We’ve missed you,” Egypt’s ministry of tourism says in its new advertising campaign , a plaintive plea for summer visitors from wealthy countries in the Persian Gulf. That is putting it mildly. For three years now, political turmoil has scared many travelers away from Egypt, leaving millions of people whose livelihoods depend on visitors desperate for any sign of an end to the most sustained tourism crisis anyone here can recall. At Cosmos , a 37-year-old tour company in Cairo that used to serve up to 30,000 customers a year, Khaled M. Ismail, the company’s director of operations, said he had not booked a single visitor since May 2013. The company’s once-hectic headquarters are deserted most of the time: Employees come in only once a week, to pay the bills. “We’re not expecting any business until 2015,” Mr. Ismail said, sitting alone in his office one recent […]

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Suicide bombers targeting a security checkpoint and a civilian bus killed at least two people in Egypt’s southern Sinai region on Friday, while in the capital, a police officer was killed in an explosion that struck a traffic post, the authorities said. The spate of attacks came just weeks before Egypt is to hold a presidential election, a milestone officials have asserted will help stabilize the country. The Sinai attacks occurred just after dawn in El Tor, the provincial capital, about 70 miles from the popular tourist resorts of Sharm el-Sheikh, the authorities said. One of the bombers approached a military checkpoint, detonating an explosive that killed two officers and the bomber. In the attack on the bus, the driver told state media that the bomber stood on the road that leads to Sharm el-Sheikh, holding what appeared to be a red icebox that presumably contained the […]

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A growing energy shortage that helped inflame the protests against President Mohamed Morsi before his ouster last year is returning to vex Egypt’s new military-led government. Festering complaints by international energy companies that Egypt has failed to pay them for pumping its petroleum or to allow them promised gas to export spilled into the open on Thursday. BG, the British company that is one of the country’s biggest gas producers, warned in a statement that its Egyptian liquefied natural gas business “is increasingly at risk” without “concerted action from the Egyptian government.” A joint venture partly owned by the Italian oil giant Eni cited similar reasons more than a year ago when it closed the only other Egyptian plant making liquefied gas, which can be shipped as well as transported by a pipeline. BG’s statement was a blunt reminder of the challenges still facing the new government, […]

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Future operations in the natural gas sector in Egypt are at risk because of poor reservoir performance and domestic offtake, BG Group said Thursday. BG Group announced its first quarter operations were hurt by issues with its liquefied natural gas business in Egypt. "Group production volumes for the first quarter were consistent with our anticipated seasonal phasing, although production entitlement from Egypt was lower than expected as domestic offtake remains well above contractual commitments and reservoir performance deteriorates," interim Executive Chairman Andrew Gould said in a statement . BG Group said that no cargoes of LNG left Egypt during the first quarter and profits from that sector of its operations were down 7 percent compared with the previous quarter. In terms of production, the company said it produced 66,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in Egypt, down 35 percent from fourth quarter 2013. […]

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Security officials say two suicide bombers have struck in Egypt’s restive Sinai Peninsula, killing one soldier and wounding nine people. The officials say the attacks happened early on Friday in the region of el-Tor. In the first attack, the bomber targeted an army checkpoint. One soldier died and five were wounded in the explosion. The second bomber stepped out on a road and blew himself up in front of a bus. Four passengers were wounded from that explosion. The officials say body parts of the bombers littered the sites of the attacks. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. Insurgent attacks in Sinai have surged since the military’s ouster last July of Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

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BG Group PLC on Thursday reported an 8% fall in first-quarter net profit because of ongoing issues in Egypt, where the company’s output fell and gas that would have been exported has been diverted to the domestic market. BG said volumes from Egyptian LNG were severely restricted with no cargoes lifted by the company in the first quarter. The U.K.’s third-largest natural gas producer posted a net profit of $1.11 billion for the three months ended March 31, compared with a profit of $1.21 billion for the first quarter of 2014. "As a result of the challenges in Egypt, the group’s 2014 production is now expected to be at the lower end of the guidance range," said interim Chief Executive Andrew Gould. Mr. Gould took the […]

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