translation: GoogleTranslate/doxa-louise
Condemnations abound after drone attack on oil giant in Saudi Arabia
Aramco's facilities hit Saturday by Yemeni rebel drones represent 5 percent of the world's crude oil production. Sunday, France has in turn condemned the attacks.
Fire at the Aramco site in Abqaiq, Saudi Arabia, on September 14th.
Oil production in Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest exporter of black gold, is temporarily cut in half after a drone attack claimed by Yemeni rebels that caused fires on two sites of the giant oil producer Aramco on Saturday (September 14th), at Abqaiq and Khurais, in the east of the country.
According to the Al Masirah television channel, a dozen drones were used for this double operation initiated a thousand kilometers away at Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, under the control - for five years now - of the Houthists. Aramco's security teams intervened to put out fires in Abqaiq and Khurais.
An investigation has been opened and the authorities have tightened security around both sites. Aramco management said no casualties were reported. According to a Reuters reporter, the fire in Abqaiq seemed to be under control in the early evening.
"Provisional suspension of production"
Saudi energy minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said on Sunday that the attacks led to "the temporary suspension of production" at the two affected sites, which represents about 50 percent of Aramco's total production. . These temporarily shut down facilities normally produce 5.7 million barrels per day, or more than 5% of the world's daily crude production.
The Abqaiq site, 60 km southwest of Dahran, the oil giant's main headquarters, is home to Aramco's largest oil processing plant, according to its website. Khurais is one of the main oil fields of the public company. The attack comes as the company Aramco prepares an IPO. On Sunday morning, when it opened, the Saudi Arabian Stock Exchange lost 3% and the energy sector fell 4.7%.
Prince Abdel Aziz ben Salmane, newly appointed Minister of Energy, reassuringly announced that part of the decline would be offset by the use of large stocks. Riyadh, the world's largest exporter of crude oil, has built five underground storage facilities across the country that can hold tens of millions of barrels of various refined petroleum products.
The US administration has said it is ready to tap the United States' emergency oil reserves if necessary to compensate for any disruption in oil markets, according to the Energy Secretary's spokesperson.
Mike Pompeo accuses Iran, which replies
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said his country has "the will and ability to face and respond to this terrorist attack , " in a telephone interview with US President Donald Trump. The White House condemned these " violent actions against civilian areas and vital infrastructure for the global economy" .
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo attacked Iran: "Tehran is behind a hundred attacks against Saudi Arabia, while [President Hassan] Rohani and [his foreign minister] , Mohamad Javad] Zarif claim to engage in diplomacy , he accuses on Twitter . In the midst of all these calls for de-escalation, Iran has launched an unprecedented attack on the planet's energy supply. " The spokesman of the Iranian Foreign Affairs, Abbas Mousavi, quickly denounced " these sterile and blind accusations and comments, which are ultimately incomprehensible and senseless " .
France has also condemned Saturday's drone attacks, which can only "aggravate tensions and the risk of conflict in the region," without mentioning Iran.
A strategy of Yemeni rebels
In a statement, Houthi rebels, a Yemeni faction politically supported by Iran, Saudi Arabia's great regional rival, claimed "a major operation against refineries in Abqaiq and Khurais" . They claim to act in response to the air strikes of the military coalition led by Ryad. It intervenes since 2015 in the war in Yemen triggered in 2014 by an offensive of the Houthists, who have seized large parts of the territory, including the capital, Sanaa. The conflict has caused the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, according to the UN.
According to experts, attacks by Yemeni rebels show that they have sophisticated weapons and pose a serious threat to Saudi Arabia, especially its oil facilities.
On August 17, they had already claimed an attack using ten drones, "the largest ever launched in Saudi Arabia," against the Shaybah field, which caused a "limited" fire , according to Aramco, on a gas installation. On 14 May, the rebels claimed responsibility for a drone attack in the Riyadh area, on two pumping stations for an east-west oil pipeline that temporarily shut down operations on this installation.
"This is a relatively new situation for the Saudis," said Kamran Bokhari, director of the Washington-based Center for Global Policy, who reminds us that security devices were designed to counter car-bomb attacks. "For a long time, they never really feared that their oil installations would be hit from the sky. "
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