- BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Authorities
have halted oil export flows from the main pipeline in southern Iraq after
intelligence showed a rebel militia could strike infrastructure, an oil
official said Saturday.
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- The shutdown kept loadings at southern oil terminals
at half their normal level, undermining the government's effort to raise
revenue as oil prices hit record highs, partly in response to the instability
in Iraq.
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- ``The situation in Basra is bad. Management ordered
the pipeline shut late yesterday,'' said the South Oil Company official,
who declined to be named.
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- ``Very few people showed up to work again today.
The feeling is it is not wise to challenge Sadr's followers.''
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- He was referring to the uprising led by anti U.S.-cleric
Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia is fighting U.S-led forces in
central and southern Iraq.
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- The Mehdi Army has vowed to attack oil facilities
in response to a U.S. offensive on Muslim Shi'ite city of Najaf.
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- The instability and damage to the main export pipeline
in the south from sabotage has disrupted Iraq's oil exports through the
past five days.
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- Only the tanker Antonius was loading Saturday at
864,000 barrels per day (bpd) from platform number two at the Basra terminal,
formerly known as Mina al-Bakr.
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- Flows to offshore terminals, which account for all
of Iraq's exports, were running through another smaller pipeline at a rate
of one million barrels per day. The larger pipeline has a capacity of 1.5
million bpd.
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- News that Iraq have stopped oil exports from the
key southern pipeline came as Iran said that global markets were oversupplied
by 2.8 million bpd of crude and that there was no reason for OPEC to raise
production to cool down sizzling oil prices.
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- U.S. benchmark crude prices soared to yet another
record of $46.65 a barrel Friday following news of a blast at the Whiting,
Indiana refinery, and on fears about possible unrest in OPEC producer Venezuela
during this weekend's referendum on the rule of President Hugo Chavez.
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- With the latest bullish news from the Middle East,
oil analysts now expect prices to soon strike $47 a barrel and head for
$50.
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