Turkey has begun offshore drilling near Cyprus and plans to send a second vessel, heightening tensions over recent gas discoveries. In early May 2019, Turkey initiated its first exploration drilling for oil and gas in the region. Now, Turkey has announced it will deploy an additional drilling vessel under the name of the Turkish Republic of Cyprus, an internationally unrecognized entity that controls Northern Cyprus. This move follows the discovery of a significant gas resources in the economic zone south of Cyprus, controlled by the Republic of Cyprus (Greek Cyprus).
This week, Turkey commenced its inaugural offshore drilling operations for oil and gas in waters near the island of Cyprus, marking a significant escalation in the ongoing energy exploration activities in the region. In a further development, Turkey has announced plans to deploy a second drilling vessel to the area, operating under the banner of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus—a political entity that is not recognized internationally and is effectively governed as a Turkish protectorate. This move comes in response to recent discoveries by the Republic of Cyprus (also known as Greek Cyprus or Southern Cyprus), which have identified a third major gas resource in its exclusive economic zone south of Cyprus. These discoveries have heightened regional tensions, as the Republic of Cyprus and Turkey continue to dispute the rights to the rich hydrocarbon reserves in the eastern Mediterranean.
Figure 1. The location of the Turkish drilling in Cypriot economic zone is marked (edited map by NordNordWest).
The Turkish drilling is hence taking place in the economic zone around the Cyprus island, while there is a principal disagreement between the Turkish version of the economic zone delineation around the island and the version of the Republic of Cyprus. United States, European Union and Egypt have all criticized the Turkish action, due to the certain drilling location within Cypriot economic waters, whereas there is no recognition to statehood of Northern Cyprus to claim any offshore areas around the island. The government of the Republic of Cyprus also issued a formal complaint to the United Nations, requesting an immediate delineation of Cypriot economic zone - borders which are typically set up by bilateral agreements in line with the Convention on the Law of the Sea.
In the meanwhile the Greek-majority Republic of Cyprus, which became a natural gas resource-owning state following three recent discoveries of offshore hydrocarbon fields cannot find a solution for developing its reserves. The industry of the Cyprus island is not sufficient to economically justify the development of the discovered reserves, while the export options remain elusive. Egypt is rapidly ramping up its own gas production and hence is unlikely to import natural gas from abroad due to limitation of its gas liquefaction facilities. The grandiose Cypriot plan for a local gas liquefaction facility is too heavy for the local economy of the island - 10 billion US Dollars and the ambitious Eastmed gas pipeline to mainland Europe is at this point more a declarative project than a real one also requiring mandatory Israeli participation and a significant price tag of 7 billion US dollars. There is also another option of a floating LNG facility with the development of this novel technology, but it's feasibility also depends on the volatile pricing of LNG.
Thus, Turkey seems to continue playing the gas game in the Eastern Mediterranean, while worsening the multi-faceted conflicts with their neighbours in the region - versus the US-aligned Sunni axis of Saudi Arabia & Egypt, the newly formed Israeli-Cypriot-Greek alliance and of course cold relations of Turkey versus Iran and versus Russia. The only true ally of Turkey in the Middle East is Qatar, but Turkey is also aligned with a number of Turkish-aligned protectorates such as North Cyprus, North Syria and to some degree the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. The desperate Turkish attempt to reach the vast reserves of oil & gas in the Eastern Mediterranean might flare-up the Cyprus dispute after many decades of relative quiet and this probably puts a final blow to the Cyprus peace process.
