Libya’s oil production is declining at a rate of 1.1 million barrels per day, according to the country’s oil minister, Mohammed Aoun, who also stated that nearly all of the country’s oil fields have been shut down. According to sources, El Sharara, Libya’s largest field, was shut down last month along with El Feel.

According to Aoun, however, “it appears that the closure instructions were issued by an official body, the Petroleum Facilities Guard in the closure areas.”

Libya is currently experiencing a new round of violence as two politicians vie for the position of Prime Minister; Interim Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah and eastern-aligned Fathi Bashaga.

According to the oil minister, Libya’s only operational fields are Hamada and the Mellitah complex, with the Wafa field occasionally producing. This means Libya is producing almost no oil, putting even more strain on a market that is already oversupplied.

Libya was already producing around 600,000 barrels per day (bpd) in May due to massive field and export terminal closures, and according to Aoun’s comments, it is now producing around 100,000 bpd.

The impact of such outages on international prices could have been enormous if it weren’t for the frequent outages in Libya and the latest news from China, which is mass-testing individuals in a Beijing district following a COVID epidemic. The latter has raised concerns about China’s demand prospects if the country decides to implement more restrictions to stop the virus from spreading.