Saboteurs
again blew up Yemen's main Marib-Ras Isa oil pipeline Tuesday night, the
country's defense ministry said Wednesday, without advising whether the flow of
crude has been affected.
"Subversive
elements blew up the pipeline at kilometer 93 in the Sirwah area in the Marib
province," the ministry said in a statement posted on its website.
The attack
caused a large fire and a leak, it said.
The
pipeline carries about 120,000 barrels of oil a day from the Marib fields to
Ras Isa export terminal on the Red Sea. It has been the target of several
attacks in the last two years, leading to the cessation of oil extraction for
almost a year in 2011 and resulting in losses of up to $15 million a day in
export earnings for the impoverished country.
Yemen,
which once produced about 270,000 barrels of oil a day, has seen its oil and
gas pipelines repeatedly sabotaged since anti-government protests broke out in
January 2011.