Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz and Palestinian counterpart Omar Kittaneh
Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz called for the lifting of an Israeli blockade so power can be delivered to Palestinians.
World Bulletin / News Desk
Turkey will send a floating power-generating ship to Gaza, Taner Yildiz, Turkey's energy minister said Tuesday.
"Turkey will built power plants in Palestine in the long term, but as a quick solution Turkey will send a 100 megawatt power- generating ship from Basra to Gaza offshore in about two to three months," Yildiz said at a press conference in Ankara with his counterpart from Palestine.
Yildiz said Israel should lift the blockade on the Gaza strip to allow power to be delivered to the city.
Yildiz said Israel hit 10 energy plants in Gaza, which means a total loss of 120 megawatts of energy for Gaza City. Yildiz said he believes Israel's attitude towards energy in Gaza will be different than its current position since having access to energy is a humanitarian issue.
For a permanent solution to Palestine's energy problems, Palestine should benefit from its own gas fields, he said. Turkey will take part from now on in any energy bid announced by the Palestine state, Yildiz said. Turkish firms will be in Palestinian gas fields like any other international outlet, he added.
The Palestinian minister of energy, Omar Kittaneh, said he met with Turkish energy firms on Monday and he is very pleased by the results. Kittaneh said they will deliver their plans for the energy sector in Palestine to Turkish authorities within a few days.
Seven floating power plants have been produced so far by the Turkish private sector with 1000 megawatts of capacity.
Israel began military operations in Gaza on July 8 and the bombardment has left much of the enclave's already fragile infrastructure in tatters, sparking warnings from the United Nations over spiralling prices and food shortages.
Karadeniz said in a statement to Reuters that it had received a request from the Palestinian authorities and that the ship would be sent within 120 days, once necessary approvals had been obtained.
The Istanbul-based company, the world's only manufacturer of self-propelled floating power stations, already produces electricity for Iraq and Lebanon, part of its fleet of seven power ships with a combined capacity of 1,200 megawatts.
Gaza's 1.8 million residents suffer from blackouts for as many as 20 hours a day. The enclave's only power plant is regularly switched off for weeks at a time because of fuel shortages.
The Israeli and Palestinian authorities on Tuesday extended a five-day ceasefire that brought a pause in a conflict that has already claimed more than 2,000 lives, most of them civilians, according to Palestinian officials.
No comments:
Post a Comment