Aug 11, 2010
Turkey-Iraq pipeline bombed

ISTANBUL - TURKISH fire-fighters on Wednesday battled to contain a raging fire on a pipeline carrying about a quarter of Iraq's crude oil exports, a day after an explosion blamed on Kurdish militants, officials said.

The bomb attack stopped the flow of oil on Tuesday on the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline and killed two people and wounded a third after their vehicles caught fire on a road that runs alongside the link.

'The fire continues, and the flow of oil has been halted. Efforts are centred on putting out the flames,' said a spokesman for Botas, Turkey's state-run pipeline operator.

The bombing, which occurred about 100 km from the Iraqi border on Tuesday at 1530 GMT (11.30pm S'pore time), was the second attack on the pipeline in Turkey in less than two months.

In July, Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas said they bombed the link, interrupting flows for several days. Officials blamed the PKK for the latest bombing too.

The conflict between the PKK and Turkish military, which began in Aug 1984 as a campaign for an independent Kurdish homeland, has claimed more than 40,000 lives, mostly Kurdish. Violence has risen this year after the militants called off a unilateral, 14-month ceasefire in June. — REUTERS

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