La crise de l’oléoduc Edjeleh-Gabès : Au cœur des enjeux de souveraineté du Maghreb (1954-1962)

Abstract

While the French-Libyan discussions (1954-1956) were retaining the attention of French oil companies, Paris was focusing on securing the evacuation of oil from the Algerian Sahara during the Algerian War (1954-1962). After the loss of the Libyan Fezzan in 1955, France decided to build a pipeline to transport oil from Edjeleh, near the Libyan border, through the Tunisian territory to the port of Skhira in the Gulf of Gabes. Tunisia was a small oil producer after the independence in 1956, however this paper highlights that after 1958 pipelines that cross the country became a vector of French and European interests to secure oil supplies. The French-Tunisian agreement of June 1958 was denounced by the Algerian National Liberation Front as an attack on Maghreb solidarity and a support to the colonizer. Certainly one of the first regional diplomatic crises, the case of the pipeline Edjeleh-Gabes, highlights the issue of sovereignty in the agenda of Algerian, Libyan and Tunisian diplomacies in the context of decolonization of North Africa.

Keywords

• Algeria
• Tunisia
• Oil
• Diplomacy
• Sovereignty
• North-Africa