1. Kurdish Hopes Of Autonomy In New Syria Unravel

    ...nister Nouri al-Maliki now the frontrunner for the post (MEES, 16 January), Iraqis are experiencing a sense of déjà vu, drawing an uneasy parallel with 2014, when ISIS fighters swept across the country under his watch, seizing Anbar province, Mosul and large swathes of territory. For now, incumbent Pr...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 23
    Published at Fri, 23 Jan 2026
  2. Qatar Hopes To Start First NFE Train In 3Q 2026

    ...cility’s imminent start-up. The project has been in the works for more than a decade, after Qatar decided in 2014 to convert its Golden Pass import terminal into an export terminal due to the surge in US gas production (MEES, 11 July 2014). Beyond adding 23% to QatarEnergy’s current LNG capacity, it wi...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 50
    Published at Fri, 12 Dec 2025
  3. Saudi Arabia Prioritizes Investment Despite Budget Deficits

    ...rging by $34.5bn to a five-year high of $65.3bn, preliminary Ministry of Finance figures show (see table). This is more than double the originally budgeted figure of $26.9bn. Having run just one budget surplus since 2014, government debt levels have been on the rise in recent years. From just $38bn in...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 49
    Published at Fri, 05 Dec 2025
  4. Syria Accelerates Its Upstream Ambitions

    ...banon unilaterally claimed its EEZ in a letter to the United Nations in 2011, but Syria – not a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) – rejected this in 2014. Last month, Lebanon’s cabinet finally approved its maritime border with Cyprus, 18 years after Beirut and Ni...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 47
    Published at Fri, 21 Nov 2025
  5. Mauritania’s Banda Integrated Gas Project Progresses

    ...ergy needs. UK based Tullow took Banda in 2011 from Malaysia’s Petronas and announced commerciality a year later (MEES, 22 February 2013) before having to cut back on investments when prices began to drop in 2014. Development plans only recovered recently when Banda and the nearby 0.9tcf Tevet fi...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 46
    Published at Fri, 14 Nov 2025
  6. US Blocks Gunvor-Lukoil Transaction

    ...nnady Timchenko exited in 2014 just ahead of being sanctioned by the US for links to Putin (MEES, 25 April 2014). Gunvor says the Treasury Department statement “is fundamentally misinformed and false,” adding that it “has for more than a decade actively distanced itself from Russia, stopped trading in...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 45
    Published at Fri, 07 Nov 2025
  7. Lebanon Approves Cyprus Maritime Border, Syria Next

    ...11, but Syria – not a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) – rejected this in 2014. Since the end of its civil war in 1990, Lebanon has oscillated between Iran-Syria and western influence. But with Hezbollah out of government in Lebanon and Syria now moving to...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 44
    Published at Fri, 31 Oct 2025
  8. Lukoil to Sell International Assets to Gunvor

    ...taining permission from the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Contral (Ofac), says Lukoil. Gunvor was founded in 2000 and has previously had to deny links to the Kremlin. In 2014, Russian co-founder Gennady Timchenko sold his 43% stake to his Swedish co-founder and Gunvor CEO Torbjörn Törnqvist ju...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 44
    Published at Fri, 31 Oct 2025
  9. Iraq Hopes Major Interest Will Spur Capacity Growth

    ...strictions. Since 2014, Iraq has announced numerous capacity targets, but most have failed to materialize. Officials this year signaled plans to increase capacity to 6-7mn b/d by the end of the decade. This would keep Iraq ahead of the UAE as Opec’s second largest producer, though the UAE could overtake it as it...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 43
    Published at Fri, 24 Oct 2025
  10. Libya Exploration Picks up as Sonatrach Resumes Drilling After 10 Years

    ...p). The firm this month resumed exploration activity at well 1A-96/2 in Areas 95-96, where Sonatrach had made several gas discoveries in 2013 (MEES, 13 September 2013). Sonatrach began drilling at well 1A-96/2 in April 2014, reaching a depth of 8,090 feet (2,465 meters), only to halt operations an...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 43
    Published at Fri, 24 Oct 2025
  11. Egypt Posts First Gas Output Rise In Three Years

    ...d-2023, though still well shy of the record 921mn cfd posted in 1Q 2014.  EGYPT GAS OUTPUT (BN CFD): Q3 OUTPUT REBOUNDS TO 4.20BN CFD FOLLOWING SUCCESSFUL DEVELOPMENT DRILLING. CAN IT BE SUSTAINED? *INCLUDES OFFSHORE, ‘EASTERN DESERT’ (GOS WEST BANK) & SINAI (E BANK). SOURCE: EGYPT PETROLEUM MI...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 42
    Published at Fri, 17 Oct 2025
  12. PDO Oil Output Rises To 70% Of Oman’s Total

    ...chniques (EOR) across its portfolio. Back in 2014, 66% of its oil production came from primary production techniques, but that balance has now flipped, with PDO expecting that 64% of its production this year will rely on water injection and EOR. OTHER OUTPUT SLUMPS                PDO has managed to in...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 41
    Published at Fri, 10 Oct 2025
  13. Algeria To Launch New Bid Round In Early-2026 Amid Shale Gas Push

    ...ploration in the Algerian Sahara in 2014 and 2015, amid environmental concerns, with violent clashes breaking out between protesters and police forces (MEES, 6 March 2015). A 2014 bid round featuring a number of shale-plays failed to garner interest, with no contracts awarded for any of the shale blocks of...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 40
    Published at Fri, 03 Oct 2025
  14. Qatar Targets 380,000 B/D From Al Shaheen

    ...s contract for the field in 2022, but output has dropped from 7,700 b/d in 2015 to 1,800 b/d in 2023. The only one of these fields on a growth trajectory of late is Al Khalij, which was awarded to TotalEnergies in 2014 (MEES, 20 March 2015). Output dropped from 23,600 b/d that year to just 10...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 40
    Published at Fri, 03 Oct 2025
  15. Saudi Arabia Doubles Deficit Forecast For 2025

    ...reseeable future, but strong economic growth in recent years means that as a share of GDP, the deficits are expected to be considerably less than over the 2014-2020 period. By way of comparison, this year’s forecast $65.3bn deficit is comparable with 2017’s $63.6bn figure. But while the 2017 deficit was eq...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 40
    Published at Fri, 03 Oct 2025
  16. Algeria Facing Fiscal Vulnerabilities Despite Recovery, IMF Warns

    ...y risks that include “global trade disruptions, conflicts including in the Middle East, and related commodity price volatility,” among others.   1: ALGERIA’S OIL OUTPUT IS DOWN 300,000 B/D SINCE THE LAST BID ROUND IN 2014, WITH THE FALL ONLY PARTLY DUE TO OPEC+ OUTPUT RESTRICTIONS* (‘00...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 39
    Published at Fri, 26 Sep 2025
  17. Barrels or Beliefs? The First Net Short in WTI and the Power of Market Narratives

    ...iqueness of the August 2025 event becomes clearer in historical context. During the 2008 financial crisis, speculative longs collapsed but never shifted into net short territory. In the 2014–2015 price collapse, hedge funds built significant short positions, yet the aggregate positioning in WTI remained ne...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 36
    Published at Fri, 05 Sep 2025
  18. Neutral Zone Output Steady As Partners Seek Capacity Gains

    ...4,000 b/d (MEES, 31 January). That was the last full year of production before fields were shut from late-2014 onwards amid disagreements over management between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait (MEES, 24 October 2014). Operations are now in full swing after that prolonged shut-in, with expansion work underway. Mu...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 34
    Published at Fri, 22 Aug 2025
  19. Apache Egypt Gas Gains Gather Pace, Oil Recovery Proves Elusive

    ...ached in the first quarter of 2014. “In Egypt, we again exceeded our quarterly gas production guidance, driven by the strong performance of our recent discoveries,” CEO John Christmann told his firm’s 7 August, Q2 earnings call. Significantly for Apache and Egypt, which is desperate for gas, ou...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 33
    Published at Fri, 15 Aug 2025
  20. Amea Joins $290mn Morocco Desalination Project Amid Controversy

    ...adir reverse osmosis desalination project in Morocco, the UAE-based firm announced on 1 August, marking its first such project in North Africa. Development of the 275,000 m³/d first phase was awarded in 2014 to Spanish firm Abengoa and came online in 2022 (MEES, 21 November 2014). Abengoa has since be...

    Volume: 68
    Issue: 32
    Published at Fri, 08 Aug 2025