Kenya on Monday rebuked Somalia for dragging it before the UN’s top court to defend a maritime border dispute that could decide the fate of potentially-lucrative Indian Ocean oil and gas reserves.
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In a hearing at the UN’s International Court of Justice, Kenya described as “absurd and hurtful” Somalia’s claims it had sought to steal crucial oil and gas reserves in a case which began in 2014.
Mogadishu’s case against Nairobi at the UN’s top court is an attempt to redraw the sea border in a move which would affect at least three of Kenya’s 20 offshore oil blocks.
Somalia says that talks have failed to find a solution to the increasingly bitter dispute, which could significantly impact a new source of revenue for either of the east African neighbours.
Somalia’s accusations of bad faith “are absurd as they are hurtful,” Kenya’s Attorney General Githu Muigai told judges at the ICJ, which was set up in 1946 to rule in disputes between countries.
“Somalia would have the court believe that during all these years, Kenya has been scheming to take advantage of its neighbour to steal its sea and oil,” he said.
At the heart of the dispute is how to draw the line of the sea boundary.
Somalia, which lies north of Kenya, wants it to continue along the line of the land border, in a southeast direction.
But Kenya wants it to go in a straight line east, along the parallel of latitude, giving it more sea territory.
The disputed triangle of water, which stretches over an area of more than 100,000 square kilometres (40,000 square miles), is believed to hold valuable deposits of oil and gas in a part of Africa only recently found to be sitting on significant reserves.