Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder travels to Tripoli later Thursday for talks with Libyan leader Moamer Gaddafi focused on deepening Germany's role in the country's oil sector, boosting trade and expanding European Union ties, senior officials said. Schroeder, who is making the first ever visit to Libya by a German leader, will be accompanied by a 25-member business delegation. Companies taking part include German giants Siemens, Deutz, Linde, Lufthansa and MAN-Ferrostahl. Germany's overall trade volume with Libya is still relatively modest - 2.3 billion euros (2.8 billion dollars) last year. But business leaders see huge potential for growth as Libya, with over 3 per cent of the world's oil reserves, sheds its status as a rogue state. Libya has for years been Germany's biggest Arab supplier of crude oil and 11 per cent of German oil comes from the country. Schroeder will on Friday travel to an oil field about 1,000 kilometres south of Tripoli in the Libyan desert with executives of Germany's biggest oil and gas producer, Wintershall, which is part of the BASF Group. Wintershall has invested more than 1.2 billion dollars in Libya and plans spend a further 400 million dollars on the five desert oil fields where it is active as well as the Mediterranean Al-Yurf offshore field, the company said in statement. Other contracts to be signed include a 350 million euro deal to modernize an oil refinery by consortium comprised of Thyssen and MAN-Ferrorstahl and a 180 million euro Siemens electrical work deal. At the political level, the officials said Berlin had two major goals: encouraging Libya to play a bigger role in the fight against terrorism and deepening Libya's relations with the European Union (E.U.) by upgrading its status at regular E.U.-Mediterranean summits. The Chancellor will be welcomed with full military honours on Thursday followed by a banquet in Gaddafi's compound, German officials said. There will be a second meeting on Friday after Schroeder returns from his oil field visit. Following talks in Libya, Schroeder travels to Algeria on October 16 for meetings with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Talks in Algiers will also focus on trade and terrorism, the officials said, adding: "Algeria is on a difficult path to a market economy."
