By Tom Wilson and Candido Mendes

(Bloomberg) — Angola’s oil minister accused neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo’s authorities of wrecking an settlement to collectively develop offshore oilfields after it did not respect the phrases of the deal.

Congo did not honor a January 2015 accord between Angolan state-owned oil firm Sonangol and Congo’s Cohydro on crude prospecting in a so-called common-interest zone, Petroleum Minister Maria Botelho de Vasconcelos stated April 17 in an interview in Luanda. The collapse is the newest setback in a long-standing disagreement between Congo and Angola over their maritime borders and entry to the world’s profitable offshore oil blocks.

“When we got to implementing the deal, the decisions were not taken forward,” Vasconcelos stated. “Many times we reach a certain consensus, but then we hear Congolese officials going back on their word.”

Congo pumps about 25,000 barrels of oil per day and desires to increase output by asserting its rights to Angolan manufacturing that it says falls inside its personal offshore space. It has formally claimed a proportion of the oil pumped from 4 Angolan blocks since 2003. The two governments signed a cooperation settlement in 2007 to create a standard curiosity zone — a maritime hall between the 2 nations through which they might collectively probe for hydrocarbons — however struggled to make additional progress.

War Buddies

The breakdown in relations comes at a troublesome time for President Joseph Kabila, whom opposition events accuse of attempting to delay presidential elections scheduled for November. Angola supported Kabila’s father, Laurent-Desire, when he seized energy in 1997 and Congo has remained depending on political and safety help from Angola since then, an element that has all the time difficult the oil negotiations.

In 2013, former Oil Minister Crispin Atama stated the 2 nations would start talks on a production-sharing settlement for the common-interest zone and will begin manufacturing from the shared block inside 36 months. Details of the ensuing 2015 business settlement with Sonangol have been by no means made public in Congo, regardless of a May 2011 decree by Congo’s authorities requiring that contracts for any cession, sale, or rental of the state’s pure assets be revealed inside 60 days of execution.

Angola’s oil minister stated that they had established a “clearly defined joint development corridor that was accepted by all parties.”

Congolese Oil Minister Aime Ngoy Mukena was not accessible when Bloomberg made 4 requests to his workplace for remark.

UN Ruling

Angola will now await a ruling from the United Nations on its December 2013 request to acknowledge the extension of its sovereign rights past the 200 nautical-mile (370-kilometer) restrict at present recorded as its unique financial zone, earlier than deciding what to do subsequent, Vasconcelos stated. The nation is open to additional negotiations, he stated.

Congo has already opposed Angola’s request in two letters to the UN in April 2014 and September 2015, paperwork on the web site of the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf present. In the letters, Congo stated Angola was “unilaterally ignoring” its rights to train management over its personal territorial sea and known as on the UN to ban consideration of Angola’s submission till the 2 nations settled their border dispute.

Chevron Corp., which has a 31 % curiosity in a production-sharing contract for block 14, a part of which is throughout the proposed widespread zone, didn’t reply to an e-mailed request for remark. Exxon Mobil Corp., BP Plc, Statoil ASA and ENI SpA even have stakes within the blocks which are half claimed by Congo, in line with charts on Sonangol’s web site.

Angola, which vies with Nigeria to be Africa’s largest oil producer, produced a mean of 1.8 million barrels per day in March, in line with OPEC.

© 2016 Bloomberg L.P