Turkiye launches new drillship to explore hydrocarbon reserves in the Mediterranean Sea

Middle East, News August 10, 2022 , by IRIA No Comments

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan inaugurated the country’s newest drilling ship that would operate in the eastern Mediterranean waters for oil and gas exploration.

Abdulhamid Han is Turkiye’s fourth and largest undersea hydrocarbon drilling ship. The ship would operate in the northwest of Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean, about 55 kilometers off the coast of Gazipasa in Antalya province.

While speaking at the ship’s launching ceremony in Mersin province, President Erdogan called the Abdulhamid Han a “symbol of Turkiye’s new vision in the area of energy.” He emphasized the need for reliable and independent sources of energy during his speech as he stated that “The sooner we can increase our natural gas and oil resources, which have turned into weapons in the global economic crisis, the more advantage we will gain in this critical process.”

Almost all of Turkiye’s underwater drilling operations are active in the Black Sea, where the country’s other three drilling ships, Fatih, Kanuni, and Yavuz, are currently deployed. Turkiye relies hugely upon oil and gas imports to meet its energy needs. Last year Turkiye purchased 45% of its natural gas from Russia. Erdogan administration is seeking alternative means to decrease its dependence on energy imports.

The launch of Abdulhamid Han into the eastern Mediterranean Sea comes at a time when tensions between Turkiye and Greece are rising. Turkiye has accused Greece of arming the islands in the Aegean Sea and escalating the situation. Natural gas and oil discoveries in the Mediterranean in the past few decades have made the region more attractive to all regional stakeholders. Turkey and Cyprus have also been embroiled in disputes related to maritime borders in the Mediterranean Sea. The EU imposed sanctions on Ankara in 2021 for ‘unauthorized’ drilling off the coast of Cyprus.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan posing with Turkiye's new advanced drilling ship, Abdulhamid Han — *^{President Recep Tayyip Erdogan posing with Turkiye’s new advanced drilling ship, Abdulhamid Han. (Image Credit: Twitter/@RTErdogan}*

“The survey and drilling work we are conducting in the Mediterranean are within our sovereign territory. We do not need to receive permission or consent from anyone for this,” Erdogan said during the launching ceremony.

The spokesperson of the Greek government Giannis Oikonomou commented on the situation by stating that “We need to be vigilant. We’ve always been doing what we have to do to have stability in our region and to fully defend international law and our own sovereign rights.”

Ankara’s Abdulhamid Han is a 238 meters long technologically advanced deep sea drilling ship. The ship can drill down to depths of 12,000 meters. This is the first time that Turkiye is sending a drilling ship to the Mediterranean since the withdrawal of the Yavuz drilling ship in September 2020. Yavuz was assigned to drill in the Black Sea where the country has discovered 540 billion cubic meters of natural gas reserves.