Libya's National Oil Company (NOC) announced Monday that protests and political rivalries have caused the interruption of crude oil exports at the Zuwetina oil terminal, one of the country's most important.

The closure of Zuwetina, one of four oil terminals in the so-called "Oil Crescent" region (east), will deprive Libya of the export of about a quarter of its production.

A NOC statement said the institution deplored the "beginning of a painful wave of closures" of oil facilities, "at a time when oil and gas prices are skyrocketing" on international markets due to the conflict in Ukraine.

Following the "forced shutdown" on Sunday of the al-Fil (south) field, employees at Zuwetina (east), Mellitah (northwest), al-Sarrir (east) and Al Khaleej (east) were "forced to progressively and fully end production," according to the company.

The production outage also affected the "Abu al-Tifl (east), al-Intissar (east), al-Nakhla (east) fields" on Sunday, as did gas production at plants associated with these sites and the port of Zuwetina, where "a group of individuals forcibly entered to force workers to end operations," the NOC specified.

The NOC President, quoted in a statement, said that the institution "is forced to declare a state of force majeure in the port of Zuwetina" and the fields and factories associated with this port "until further notice."

Libya, divided by power struggles between east and west since the fall of Muammar Kadhafi's regime in 2011, currently has two rival executives.

The NOC has repeatedly stressed the importance of "preserving the neutrality" of the oil sector and keeping it on the fringes of "political conflicts," Sanalla stressed in the statement.