- Title: IRAQ: OIL PIPELINE ON FIRE, NEAR BAGHDAD
- Date: 16th October 2003
- Summary: (W7) HADITHA, IRAQ, (OCTOBER, 16, 2003) (REUTERS) 1. WIDE OF U.S. ARMY VEHICLES NEAR THE BURNING PIPELINE 0.04 2. VARIOUS , HUGE CLOUD OF BLACK SMOKE FROM PIPELINE (2 SHOTS) 0.16 3. SLV FIREFIGHTERS APPROACHING PIPELINE (2 SHOTS) 0.29 4. CLOSE OF BURNING FLAMES 0.40 5. SCU (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic), KHALID SABAH, A FIRE FIGHTER, SAYING: "This is the second attack on the pipeline, which extends from Kirkuk. The blast happened by midnight." 0.52 6. VARIOUS OF THICK BLACK SMOKE RISING FROM BURNING PIPELINE (2 SHOTS) 1.03 7. SLV U.S. SOLDIERS AT THE SCENE OF BLAST AND THICK SMOKE IN THE BACKGROUND 1.10 (W7) SADR CITY, BAGHDAD, IRAQ (OCTOBER 16, 2003) (REUTERS) 8. WIDE OF TWO U.S. ARMY TANKS BLOCKING ROADS; SOLDIERS NEXT TO THE TANKS 1.15 9. SLV U.S SOLDIERS WALKING BY TANKS 1.21 10. VARIOUS OF U.S. SOLDIER SETTING UP BARBED-WIRE BARRICADE (2 SHOTS) 1.30 11. SLV SOLDIERS IN FRONT OF A TANK 1.35 12. SLV IRAQI POLICE CAR DRIVING BY TANKS 1.39 13. VARIOUS OF U.S. TANKS AND SOLDIERS (4 SHOTS) 2.00 14. WIDE OF U.S TANKS AND SOLDIERS 2.06 15. SLV U.S SOLDIER STANDING ON PATROL IN ROAD 2.11 16. WIDE OF LARGE PORTRAIT OF MUHAMMED SADEQ AL-SADR, MUQTADA'S FATHER 2.16 17. SLV GUN BARREL AND IRAQI CIVILIANS IN STREET 2.21 18. VARIOUS OF STREET SCENES IN SADR CITY AT NIGHT 2.29 19. SLV IRAQI POLICE AT SITE 2.33 20. SCU (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic), NA'EEM al-KA'BI, HEAD OF AL-SADR CITY COUNCIL, SAYING: "U.S. troops backed by, armoured vehicles and tanks and air force backup stormed the building of the city council, which is elected by the people of the city, and they detained a number of the city council's members." 2.57 21. VARIOUS OF IRAQI POLICE AT SITE (3 SHOTS) 3.11 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 31st October 2003 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: HADITHA / AL-SADR CITY- BAGHDAD,IRAQ
- Country: Iraq
- Reuters ID: LVAB9247D69Y0G3QKP747TDSYJ8
- Story Text: An oil pipeline west of Baghdad was still on
fire as US troops arrived to battle the blaze. Heavy security
in Baghdad following the detention of a radical Shi'ite
cleric's supporters.
Iraq's oil industry suffered another blow when a
sabotage blast hit the pipeline carrying crude oil from the
northern Kirkuk fields to a refinery and power plant in
Baghdad on Thursday (October 16), forcing engineers to
divert crude from the country's southern fields and cut
exports.
There were no reports yet on the scale of the damage
sustained to the pipeline.
A powerful fire that engulfed a lake in Haditha, a town
west of Baghdad in the Sunni triangle that was Saddam
Hussein's power base, was doused by fire-fighting teams, an
official with the U.S.-led Civilian Provisional Authority
said.
The CPA official said a team from the U.S.-led
administration joined Iraqis heading to the site of the
explosion to investigate its cause.
Revenues from steady exports are vital for Iraq as it
rebuilds after war, years of crippling economic sanctions
and economic mismanagement under Saddam, who was toppled by
a U.S.-led invasion in April.
Since then oil pipelines have been the biggest economic
casualty of a sabotage campaign the U.S.-led administration
blames on remnants of Saddam's Baath party.
The northern line to Turkey was badly damaged in a
sabotage attack in mid-August, just as it was about to
resume shipments of crude after the war.
It is expected to resume pumping at a rate of 250,000
barrels per day (bpd), the source said. The pipeline to the
Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan carried around 800,000
bpd before the war.
The oil source cautioned the pipeline would remain in
the same vicious circle of sabotage and repair until
security improves.
That is a daunting task in a country where bombs can be
purchased for $10 and used against exposed export routes
that run for hundreds of miles through desert. The U.S.
administration had said it would hire a foreign company to
protect the pipelines.
Meanwhile, U.S. forces maintained heavy presence in
Baghdad's teeming Sadr City suburb, following the detention
of a dozen supporters of radical Shi'ite cleric Muqtada
al-Sadr.
Heavily armed U.S. forces surrounded the impoverished
city as tanks blocked a number of the main roads and
squares, manning checkpoints and setting up barbed-wire
barricades.
Police spokesman Captain Basim Mahmoud said the
detainees, followers of Moqtada al-Sadr, had been brought
to police headquarters in Baghdad.
U.S. troops and armoured vehicles were ringing the
municipality building at dusk and a U.S. commander said
they were securing the area after Sadr's men had gone.
Sadr, who is based in the holy city of Najaf, south of
Baghdad, has a youthful following in the slums of Sadr
City, home to about two million Shi'ites.
His group had been using the municipality building,
headquarters of a U.S.-backed district council, to run its
own social services in a parallel administration.
The district council asked Iraqi police earlier this
week to remove Sadr's people from the building.
Sadr has demanded the immediate departure of U.S.
troops and the establishment of an Islamic state, but has
stopped short of calling for violence against them.
U.S. military officials said several people taken
hostage by Sadr's supporters in the shrine city of Kerbala,
south of Baghdad, earlier this week had now been released.
Sadr's group had tried to take over the Imam Hussein
shrine in Kerbala, sparking armed clashes with supporters
of Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, in
which at least one person was killed.
Last week a suicide car bomb ripped through a police
station at the Sadr City, formerly known as Saddam city,
killing three policemen and five civilians and injuring
several others.
Shi'ite, the largest community in Iraq was systematically
oppressed by Saddam Hussein's Sunni elite.
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