Filenews 26 August 2024 - by Chrysanthos Manoli
The Israeli company New Med, which participates together with the American Chevron and Shell in the management of the Aphrodite field, in block 12 of the Cypriot EEZ, informed the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange that the Minister of Energy of Cyprus, George Papanastasiou, sent a letter yesterday, August 25, informing them that they have violated the terms of the contract signed (revised) in 2019 and must lift within 3 months to avoid breach of contract.
Otherwise, Papanastasiou warns, the Republic of Cyprus will have the right to terminate the license and consequently deprive Aphrodite's partners of their rights to exploit the deposit.
This is a very serious development, which reveals the difficulties of understanding between the two sides for the implementation of the 2019 agreement, which amended an earlier agreement between the two parties, to the benefit of the companies.
According to the announcement of New Med (formerly Delek) on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, the Aphrodite consortium intends to submit within the next few days an updated development plan ("updated development and production plan") for approval by the Government of Cyprus. This plan has been prepared on the basis of the initial development and production plan, as previously approved by the Government of Cyprus.
The violation referred to by the Minister of Energy is likely to be related to the delay on the part of the consortium to promote within the agreed timeframes the detailed techno-economic study FEED, on which the future final investment decision (FID) for the exploitation of the deposit will be based.
