Australian engineering firms stay away from Libya

Australian engineering firms Leighton Holdings and WorleyParsons are avoiding Libya for now due to uncertainty remaining in the country following Muammar Gaddafi' s killing, local media reported on Friday. WorleyParsons said there were no immediate plans to resume the operations in the country. In February, the company evacuated more than two dozen expatriate employees from Libya amid bloody unrest. A WorleyParsons spokesman said it was uncertain when the company would start again operations in Libya. "We'll evaluate when it's appropriate to do so based on the situation on the ground at the time," the spokesman told the Australian Associated Press (AAP) on Friday. Leighton spokesman Justin Grogan said the company had not been actively seeking work in Libya for some time and plans to expand into Libya had been shelved indefinitely. "I think realistically, with what's been happening in that Northern African region that all bets are off for the foreseeable future," Grogan told AAP on Friday. "In the long term, we'd potentially consider that market, but that's obviously not realistic at the moment, given what's happened and the uncertainty that's been in Libya for the last few months."