New Protests Threaten to Take Key Libyan Refinery Offline

Just days after similar protests shut down the country’s largest oilfield, Sharara, new protests against corruption and distribution of oil wealth have erupted again in Libya, threatening to shut down two oil and gas facilities within 72 hours.  The two facilities, at the Zawiya refinery, west of Tripoli, pump gas from the Mellitah complex, owned by Italian Eni and the Libyan National Oil Company (NOC), and halting operations here would interrupt the flow of gas through the Libya-Italy Greenstream pipeline.  If protesters succeed,…