‘Chokepoint windfall’ offers Algeria a rare opening

History has handed Algeria an improbable second chance. Four years after the Russia-Ukraine war elevated Algerian hydrocarbons into a strategic European necessity, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has again pushed Algiers into the center of global energy politics. Nearly 20 percent of global oil flows and a comparable share of LNG shipments normally pass through the waterway’s narrow corridor. Once maritime traffic through the Gulf became constrained, Europe immediately rediscovered the value of geography. Few producers sit in a more advantageous position during such a disruption.