Turkey offers Libya $250 million in loan

TRIPOLI - Anatolia News Agency

Economy Minister Zafer Çağlayan speaks at the Turkey-Libya Business Forum in Tripoli yesterday, supporting Libya as a strategic investment location.

Turkey’s Eximbank has decided to allocate some $250 million to Libya following its move the day before to extend $500 million to Tunisia, said Turkey’s Economy Minister Zafer Çağlayan at the Turkey-Libya Business Forum in Tripoli yesterday. 

“Our Libyan brothers will be able use this loan toward their investments, their purchases of machinery and other products from Turkey with a 10-year payback period,” said Çağlayan. If the Libyans found the $250 million too 
little, the Turkish government was prepared to increase the sum, he added. 

“We are also here to support the Turkish businessmen who are impatiently waiting to invest in Libya,” said Çağlayan, expressing that the Turkish government wanted to ensure Libya was at the top of the list of countries in which to invest. He said Libya’s economy was not only based on petrol but should also have a flourishing industrial, tourism, trade and agricultural sector. 

‘Libya to regroup losses’

Çağlayan assured the Libyans that in the shortest amount of time the country would make up its losses from the Arab Spring and civil war tenfold. According to a study on behalf of the Turkish government, Çağlayan said Libya had lost roughly $7.6 billion in gross domestic product for 2011.