With a treasure trove of hydrocarbon reserves thought to lie beneath the sea, the stakes are high: the winner could emerge as an energy broker in charge of Europe's gas supplies for decades to come."If the findings are as big as they say then the power political parameters of the region will shift," said Hubert Faustmann, a political science professor at the University of Nicosia in Cyprus.
"We're talking about trillions of cubic metres of hydrocarbons worth billions of dollars."
The row erupted after the divided Mediterranean island instructed a US company, Noble Energy, to begin drilling off its southern shores last month.
