Cyprus to renegotiate offshore gas deposit contract

Cyprus's energy minister says the country will renegotiate the financial terms of its contract with a consortium on exploiting a gas field off its southern shore.

Georgios Lakkotrypis told reporters on Tuesday that the consortium made up of Texas-based Noble Energy, Israel's Delek and Royal Dutch Shell wants to renegotiate the contract on the Aphrodite gas field.

The field is estimated to hold around 4.5 trillion cubic feet of gas.

Lakkotrypis said the consortium wants to renegotiate because current, lower global oil prices don't make viable a preliminary deal to sell Aphrodite gas to a Shell-operated processing plant in Egypt.

He said gas sale revenue was projected to start flowing into state coffers by 2022.

Lakkotrypis said the aim is for a speedy agreement with the consortium to avoid delays. [AP]