Pakistanis angry over detentions in Times Sq. case Monday, May 24, 2010
ISLAMABAD – Relatives of three men detained by Pakistan for alleged links to the suspect in the attempted Times Square bombing say the men are innocent.
They
AFP - Thursday, August 6TAIPEI (AFP) - - Taiwan's Beijing-friendly government on Wednesday denied boycotting an Australian film festival amid a row over the e
BERLIN (Reuters) - Chancellor Angela Merkel suffered a double blow on Thursday as a senior party ally in east German
Minister seeks closure of anti-Berlusconi websites Wednesday, December 16, 2009
ROME (AFP) - – The Italian government moved Tuesday to close down Internet sites encouraging further violence against Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who
By ELAINE KURTENBACH,AP Business Writer AP - Wednesday, March 18SHANGHAI - Asia's stock market rally seemed to be running out of steam Wednesday, despite an
Edition:
U.S.
Africa
Arabic
Argentina
Brazil
Canada
China
France
Germany
India
Italy
Japan
Latin America
Mexico
Russia
Spain
United Kingdom
Home
Business
Business Home
Economy
Technology
Media
Small Business
Legal
Deals
Earnings
Social Pulse
Business Video
The Freeland File
Markets
Markets Home
U.S. Markets
European Markets
Asian Markets
Global Market Data
Indices
M&A
Stocks
Bonds
Currencies
Commodities
Futures
Funds
peHUB
World
World Home
U.S.
Brazil
China
Euro Zone
Japan
Mexico
Russia
India Insight
World Video
Reuters Investigates
Decoder
Politics
Politics Home
Election 2012
Campaign Polling
Tales from the Trail
Political Punchlines
Supreme Court
Politics Video
Tech
Technology Home
MediaFile
Science
Tech Video
Tech Tonic
Social Pulse
Opinion
Opinion Home
Chrystia Freeland
John Lloyd
Felix Salmon
Jack Shafer
David Rohde
Bernd Debusmann
Nader Mousavizadeh
Lucy P. Marcus
David Cay Johnston
Bethany McLean
Anatole Kaletsky
Edward Hadas
Hugo Dixon
Ian Bremmer
Lawrence Summers
Susan Glasser
The Great Debate
Steven Brill
Jack & Suzy Welch
Frederick Kempe
Christopher Papagianis
Mark Leonard
Breakingviews
Equities
Credit
Private Equity
M&A
Macro & Markets
Politics
Breakingviews Video
Money
Money Home
Tax Break
Lipper Awards 2012
Global Investing
MuniLand
Unstructured Finance
Linda Stern
Mark Miller
John Wasik
James Saft
Analyst Research
Alerts
Watchlist
Portfolio
Stock Screener
Fund Screener
Personal Finance Video
Money Clip
Investing 201
Life
Health
Sports
Arts
Faithworld
Business Traveler
Entertainment
Oddly Enough
Lifestyle Video
Pictures
Pictures Home
Reuters Photographers
Full Focus
Video
Reuters TV
Reuters News
Article
Comments (1)
Counterparties: Today's Best Links
Investors want to break up big banks
The new call to break up America's biggest banks is coming not from activists, but from profit-minded investors, Bloomberg reports. Read more at Counterparties
Why Germany might not save Europe
Damning emails from the LIBOR settlement
Get Counterparties delivered to your inbox!
Follow Reuters
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
YouTube
Read
Top court upholds healthcare law in Obama triumph
|
5:35pm EDT
Ann Curry gives tearful farewell to "Today" Show
11:02am EDT
Wall Street pares losses late, ends modestly lower
|
5:17pm EDT
U.S. stocks sag on healthcare ruling, euro dips
4:54pm EDT
Supreme Court strikes down military medal lying law
12:23pm EDT
Discussed
179
Supreme Court to deliver Obama healthcare law ruling
93
California tobacco tax hike narrowly defeated at polls
94
Sandusky lawyers may use NBC tape error in appeal
Watched
Court finds Kim Dotcom raid illegal
Wed, Jun 27 2012
Hong Kong's dirty habits
Wed, Jun 27 2012
EU leaders gather for family photo, but divisions remain over policy
2:19pm EDT
Pictures
Reuters Photojournalism
Our day's top images, in-depth photo essays and offbeat slices of life. See the best of Reuters photography. See more | Photo caption
Raging wildfires
Raging fires strike Colorado and Utah. Slideshow
Health in America
An essay of photos taken by Reuters photographers during assignments on health care. Slideshow
Exclusive: Saudi readies oil line to counter Iran Hormuz threat
Tweet
Share this
Email
Print
Related News
Oil steady as U.S. storm fears ease, eyes on Europe
Mon, Jun 25 2012
Japan, China to import Iran oil after EU ban
Wed, Jun 20 2012
Brent crude dips as Iran, West plan July talks
Tue, Jun 19 2012
Oil falls on euro zone worry, fading stimulus hope
Mon, Jun 18 2012
Prince Salman named Saudi heir at time of turmoil
Mon, Jun 18 2012
Analysis & Opinion
RBI vs the govt: who will blink first?
The quiet influence of Kuwait’s Salafis
Related Topics
World »
Saudi Arabia »
Iraq »
By Amena Bakr and Daniel Fineren
DUBAI |
Thu Jun 28, 2012 3:37pm EDT
DUBAI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has reopened an old oil pipeline built by Iraq to bypass Gulf shipping lanes, giving Riyadh scope to export more of its crude from Red Sea terminals should Iran try to block the Strait of Hormuz, industry sources told Reuters.
Riyadh took the step as international pressure grows on Iran to curb a nuclear program that Western powers say has a covert military purpose. A European Union embargo on buying Iranian oil takes full effect on Sunday, cutting Tehran's income.
With the sanctions regime tightening on Iran, grains traders said its attempts to secure millions of metric tons (1.1023 tons) of wheat through barter deals with India and Pakistan are failing, and Tehran is about to pay premium prices on international markets to secure food supplies and stave off popular unrest.
Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili warned world powers on Thursday against adopting "unconstructive measures" that harm talks, state television reported. "Those who replace logic in talks with illegitimate tools are responsible for harming the constructive trend of talks," Jalili wrote to EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.
The effects of tensions have been diverse, with Saudi Arabia's decision to widen its export routes the latest evidence of states in the region preparing for difficulties.
The Iraqi Pipeline in Saudi Arabia (IPSA), laid across the kingdom in the 1980s after oil tankers were attacked in the Gulf by both sides during the Iran-Iraq war, has not carried Iraqi crude since Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990.
Saudi Arabia confiscated the pipeline in 2001 as compensation for debts owed by Baghdad and has used it to transport gas to power plants in the west of the country in the last few years.
Iran threatened in January to block the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for U.S. and European sanctions that target its oil revenues in an attempt to stop the nuclear program.
An EU ban on Iranian oil starts on Sunday and Israel has threatened military action against the country's nuclear facilities if talks with Western powers fail to stop uranium enrichment.
Alarmed, Saudi Arabia has now quietly reconditioned IPSA to carry crude, test pumping along the line over the last four to five months, several sources with knowledge of the project say.
"The testing started because Saudi Arabia wanted to secure alternative routes to export oil," an industry source in Saudi Arabia said.
Western industry sources said the tests through the 1.65-million barrel-a-day line had delivered into storage facilities at Mu'ajjiz near Yanbu on the Red Sea for at least four months.
More than a third of the world's seaborne oil exports pass through the narrow Strait of Hormuz from the oilfields of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Kuwait, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Qatar's liquefied natural gas exports are all shipped through Hormuz.
PETROLINE
Worried about its reliance on Gulf shipping, Saudi Arabia increased its capacity in 1992 to pump oil from fields predominantly clustered in the east across the country to the Red Sea. Capacity rose to about 5 million barrels a day through two parallel pipelines known as the Petroline.
Saudi crude exports run as high as 8 million bpd but rising demand for its crude in Asia, shipped out of the Gulf, and falling demand from Europe, usually sourced from Red Sea ports, meant Petroline's pumping capacity was never fully used.
The smaller Petroline pipeline was converted to carry natural gas from the east to booming industrial centers in the west a few years ago, slashing Saudi's east-west crude transport capacity to Red Sea ports.
Saudi Red Sea industries are now reliant on gas fed from fields over 1,000 km away and the prospect of cutting them off to export crude through Petroline during a Gulf shipping blockade is not an attractive option.
Until recently the Saudi government had considered the risk of such a disruption in the Gulf too small and its western gas needs too great to switch Petroline fully back to oil. But as tensions over Iran's nuclear program rose, it decided to put IPSA on standby to transport more crude west in an emergency.
The United Arab Emirates has built its own Hormuz bypass pipeline, which is due to start exporting from the Gulf of Oman next month.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^>
With its oil income crimped by embargoes and its ability to import essential products curtailed by sanctions targeting its banking system, Iran had turned to India and Pakistan for wheat to meet some of its needs, but grain traders say talks with both Delhi and Islamabad are deadlocked.
Food is not targeted under Western sanctions aimed at deterring Iran's nuclear program, but in recent months it has paid high prices for grain to work around a freeze on financial transactions due to the measures.
"There is great doubt in the market about whether the Indian deal will happen. They are never going to get the phyto-sanitary standards worked out," a European grains trader said. "The Indian wheat cannot reach the standards the Iranians traditionally demand."
As Iran's second-biggest crude client, India hoped to reassure Tehran on quality and secure wheat sales to help settle part of its $10 billion a year-plus oil import bill through a barter-style mechanism using rupees. India said last week it can export up to 3 million metric tons of wheat if supplies are requested.
In Washington, sources said the Obama administration is expected to extend exceptions on Iran financial sanctions to China and Singapore, perhaps as early as Thursday.
"There should be an announcement today," on China - Iran's top buyer of crude - and on Singapore which buys fuel oil from the OPEC member, said one of the sources who works in the U.S. government. Earlier this month the administration granted exceptions to India and six other economies. Japan and 10 EU countries got the exceptions in March.
Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Qasemi warned South Korea on Thursday that Tehran would reconsider ties with Seoul if the country stopped importing oil from Iran, the official IRNA news agency reported.
South Korea announced on Monday it would halt imports of Iranian crude from July 1 due to an EU ban on insuring tankers carrying Iranian oil, becoming the first major Asian consumer of Iranian crude to announce suspension of crude imports.
(Additional reporting by Reem Shamseddine in Khobar, Richard Mably and Peg Mackey in London; editing Richard Mably and David Stamp)
World
Saudi Arabia
Iraq
Tweet this
Link this
Share this
Digg this
Email
Reprints
We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/
Comments (1)
ZenGalacticore wrote:
Edition:
U.S.
Africa
Arabic
Argentina
Brazil
Canada
China
France
Germany
India
Italy
Japan
Latin America
Mexico
Russia
Spain
United Kingdom
Back to top
Reuters.com
Business
Markets
World
Politics
Technology
Opinion
Money
Pictures
Videos
Site Index
Legal
Bankruptcy Law
California Legal
New York Legal
Securities Law
Support & Contact
Support
Corrections
Connect with Reuters
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn
RSS
Podcast
Newsletters
Mobile
About
Privacy Policy
Terms of Use
AdChoices
Copyright
Our Flagship financial information platform incorporating Reuters Insider
An ultra-low latency infrastructure for electronic trading and data distribution
A connected approach to governance, risk and compliance
Our next generation legal research platform
Our global tax workstation
Thomsonreuters.com
About Thomson Reuters
Investor Relations
Careers
Contact Us
Thomson Reuters is the world's largest international multimedia news agency, providing investing news, world news, business news, technology news, headline news, small business news, news alerts, personal finance, stock market, and mutual funds information available on Reuters.com, video, mobile, and interactive television platforms. Thomson Reuters journalists are subject to an Editorial Handbook which requires fair presentation and disclosure of relevant interests.
NYSE and AMEX quotes delayed by at least 20 minutes. Nasdaq delayed by at least 15 minutes. For a complete list of exchanges and delays, please click here.