Kuwaitis douse first Iraqi oil fire in south

Reuters | 3/24/03 | Angus MacSwan

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Kuwaitis douse first Iraqi oil fire in south

By Angus MacSwan

KUWAIT, March 24 (Reuters) - Kuwaiti firefighters doused on Monday the first of seven oil wells blazing in Iraq's vast southern Rumaila field as sporadic guerrilla-style resistance by armed Iraqis continued nearby.

"We have just finished putting out the fire and are in the process of capping the well," a senior Kuwaiti oil official told Reuters.

A crack team from Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) is now tackling six other wellheads on fire at the southern end of the 50-mile-long Rumaila oilfield near the border with Kuwait.

The team, which fights fires only during daylight hours, could take up to four weeks to finish its task.

"The area in Iraq we are in right now is under the control of British forces and we have seen nobody else for the past three days, except these and U.S. troops," the Kuwaiti team head told Reuters from the scene.

Aside from the burning wells, another 10-15 have been mined, he said.

While British troops are firming their grip on the southern oil region, a Kuwaiti oil executive said there were security problems in the northern section of the Rumaila field.

Small groups of Iraqi troops in civilian clothes made it unsafe for journalists to travel to the region, British Lieutenant Colonel Rob Partridge told Reuters.

"At the moment there are groups of Iraqi forces dressed in civilian clothes in the area," he said. "They are all over the bloody place."

Southern fields normally account for half Iraq's oil output, ranked as the world's seventh largest before the war.

REBUILDING IRAQ

Widespread destruction of Iraq's oil infrastructure would be bad news for Washington, which hopes to use oil wealth to rebuild the country after war.

Departing Iraqi troops torched more than 700 Kuwaiti oil wells in the 1991 Gulf War, setting off conflagrations that took months to extinguish.

"We are using our experience to make sure that Iraqi oil can be used for the Iraqi people and also to make sure that we stop the damage to the environment," acting Kuwaiti Oil Minister Sheikh Ahmad al-Fahd al-Sabah said of his 50-strong team.

U.S. marines first secured crucial gas-oil separation plants at Rumaila and a pumping station at Zubair on Friday, the U.S. military said.

Washington has already stepped up security around the oil wellheads to prevent Baghdad from destroying the sector.

"They won't be able to destroy the wells," U.S. military spokeswoman Lieutenant Colonel Jennifer Cassidy told Reuters.

The Kuwaiti experts arrived in Iraq over the weekend with water supplies and equipment ahead of the Texas-based Boots and Coots International Well Control team who will help assess and control the damage.

Success in the south has yet to be matched in the north, home to the Kirkuk oilfield, where U.S. military action is intensifying.

Warplanes from the U.S.-led forces pounded Iraqi frontline positions near Chamchamal in the latest sign of increased military activity in Kurd-controlled northern Iraq.

Military officials said there is no evidence of sabotage at the 76-year old oilfield, which can pump up to 900,000 bpd and contribute some 40 percent of Iraqi exports.

Iraqi oil exports from the Gulf have stopped, but oil was still flowing through a pipeline to Turkey on Monday, Turkish sources said. Pumping rates fell as storage tanks filled and trading companies were reluctant to buy the oil.