Hargeysa, Somaliland, May 28, 2011 – Somaliland revoked Total Mer Rouge SA’s license to manage an oil-storage facility at the port of Berbera after it failed to import fuel into the country for the past two years.

The government of Somaliland will take over management of the facility with immediate effect, President Ahmed Mohamud said in a decree yesterday in the capital, Hargeysa.

The edict was issued after Somaliland’s parliament refused to ratify an agreement between Total Mer Rouge and the government, according to the statement from Mohamud. The company took over management of Berbera port’s oil-storage facilities in January 2000, Jamhuuriya, a Hargeysa-based media group, reported in 2000.

Total SA, the Paris-based oil company, sold Total Mer Rouge last year, Total spokesman Michael Crochet-Vourey said by phone today from Paris. He declined to comment further.

Total Mer Rouge is based in Ethiopia, according to the website of Mbendi Information Services. Two phone calls to a number for the company listed by Mbendi didn’t connect.

Somaliland, a former British colony, declared independence from Somalia in 1991 after the fall of dictator Mohammed Siyad Barre. While no country has yet officially recognized its independence it has remained largely free of the clan warfare, kidnappings and assassinations that have plagued Somalia.

--With assistance from Tara Patel in Paris. Editors: Paul Richardson, Philip Sanders.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mohamoud Ali Mohamed via Nairobi at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Richardson at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.

Source: Bloomberg

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