CAIRO: The Cairo Administrative Court ruled Tuesday to freeze Egypt’s natural gas exports to Israel, saying that the export of natural resources requries parliamentary approval.
Although the verdict called to end the exportation of gas to Israel, there is still an appeals process and it is expected that the government will pursue that course of action.
The court ruled that national resources belong to current and future generations, and the executive must first get the parliament s approval, a security source told AFP.
The case was brought by former diplomat Ibrahim Yousry, who is the lawyer representing the Popular Campaign Against the Export of Egyptian Gas to Israel. The suit aimed to cancel the decision of the Minister of Petroleum to export gas to Israel and to protect the resources of the country, a campaign statement read.
The campaign believes that Egypt s natural gas would be better appropriated in local consumption.
Another member of the campaign, Abdallah Helmy, told Daily News Egypt after the verdict, This shows that the Egyptian judiciary has listened and responded to the wishes of the Egyptian people.
Helmy pointed out that the campaign would not stop its activities with the verdict.
Now that we have judicial legitimacy, we will be requesting from President Hosni Mubarak as head of the executive branch to carry out the decision, he said.
There was a severe objection to the Israeli deal specifically because of the lower than market price on which the deal was struck.
There has also been opposition to the deal due to the continued siege of the Gaza Strip, in which fuel shortages are enormous. Many have opposed exporting gas to Israel while 1.5 million Palestinians face crippling fuel shortages.
The 15-year deal was struck in a memorandum of understanding signed in 2005 between the two countries. Gas started flowing to Israel in February.
The company responsible for the deal is the Egyptian Israeli consortium Eastern Mediterranean Gas (EMG) which has a contract initially for 15 years guaranteeing a supply of 1.7 billion cubic meters a year at the price of $1.5 per million BTU (British Thermal Units).
EMG is a private energy consortium co-owned by Egyptian businessman Hussein Salem and the Israeli Merhav Group. The gas being supplied to Israel specifically goes to the Israel Electric Corporation.
