LIBYAN OIL OUTPUT: DOWN

Libya's energy recovery has suffered its first major setback, with output falling below 700,000 barrels a day after insecurity forced the country's largest oil field to shut down, oil officials said Wednesday.

The North African nation's oil production had risen to 870,000 barrels a day on Sunday—nearly six times the level of late May—after deals with militants and protesters allowed fields and ports to reopen.

Production has been temporarily shut down at the 340,000-barrels-a-day Sharara field after a rocket hit a tank at the terminal it supplies, the Libyan oil officials said.

The port's area in the city of Zawiya has been embroiled in clashes between Islamists-backed militias and their nationalist rivals. During a previous battle that ended up with the Islamists seizing Tripoli last month, several fuel tanks caught fire after being hit by shells.

Libya's internationally recognized government and parliament are now rivalled by Islamist ones in Tripoli and were forced to relocate to the Eastern city of Tobruk.

Abdelmajid Shagan, a former engineer with Waha Oil Co., a Libyan oil joint-venture with U.S. companies, has been proposed to parliament as energy minister, according to lawmaker Musab Elabed.

Libyan officials have said the position of oil minister would be discontinued.

wsj.com