Egyptian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El Molla, stated that Egypt’s debt towards international oil and gas companies (IOC) increased from $3.2b to $3.58b as of the end of September, reported Reuters.

Meanwhile, Al Borsa stated that the debts increased from $3.5b at the end of fiscal year 2015/2016 to around $3.6b. The accumulated arrears amount steams from August 2015 as Egypt hasn’t been able to meet its obligations towards IOCs due to fluctuations in the availability of USD. Although, the oil ministry had aimed to reduce the amount to $2.5b by the end of 2015 and pay them off completely by the end of 2016.

It is noted that Egypt did managed to partially playback some the owed payments. Egypt Oil&Gas reported in August that Egypt had paid off an $100m of accumulated arrears from previous years.