Sisi says dream comes true to build Egypt into energy hub

CAIRO, Feb. 21 (Xinhua) -- Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi said Wednesday the dream of turning Egypt into a regional energy hub is becoming a reality, referring to a number of gas deals signed, official Ahram Online website reported.

Sisi's comments came during the opening ceremony of a number of investor service centers in Egypt.

Commenting on the controversial 15 billion U.S. dollars gas deal between Israeli companies and a private Egyptian company, Sisi said that Egypt has "nothing to hide about this deal."

"Egypt is now one of the few countries in the Mediterranean region that owns facilities fully capable of providing all oil-related services," Sisi said, adding that Egypt will use these facilities to liquefy the imported gas for later export or for domestic industrial use.

Sisi said that Egypt has developed these facilities before other countries in the region like Lebanon, Israel, Cyprus and Turkey, which will allow Egypt to benefit by having oil from Mediterranean countries liquefied in Egypt.

"We had to take advantage of this opportunity to attract Cypriot, Lebanese and Israeli gas in preparation for liquefaction and export," he said.

"We scored a goal," Sisi said, referring to the recent gas deals and other achievements in the gas sector, though he stressed that these agreements are reached by the private sector and not the state.

Israel-based Delek and Texas-based Noble Energy signed on Monday a 15 billion dollars deal to export natural gas to Egypt.

The gas will be drilled from Israel's offshore natural gas fields, Tamar and Leviathan.

Under the agreement, Delek and Noble Energy, which control the gas fields, will provide Egypt's Dolphinus Holdings Ltd. with about 64 billion cubic meters of natural gas from the two fields over a period of ten years.

Delek said it is looking into several options to transfer the gas to Egypt. The company is also considering going into negotiations with the East Mediterranean Gas Company, known also as EMG, an Israeli-Egyptian corporation.

"Egypt will benefit financially from this process on a very large scale, now all the gas in the region is coming to us to be exported," Sisi said.

The Egyptian president affirmed that Egypt has taken another step towards becoming a regional energy hub.

"I know people may ask how is it that we have just inaugurated the Zohr gas field to achieve self-sufficiency, but we are still exporting gas from other countries, but I assure you we are doing this according to market mechanisms," Sisi said.

Egypt has recently celebrated the early production of its Zohr gas field, the largest in the Mediterranean Sea, which was discovered by Italy's oil giant Eni in August 2015.

Once an energy exporter, Egypt has turned into a net importer in recent years, squeezed by declining production and increasing consumption.

However, Egypt is back on track to be an exporter soon after a big number of recent discoveries across the country that attracted several international firms for oil exploration over the past years. Enditem