DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
South Sudan will try to boost non-oil revenue after it shut its own oil production and halted shipments over a dispute with Sudan over oil transit fees, the South Sudan president said late Monday.
In a national address, President Salva Kiir said the dispute with Sudan had reached "unacceptable" levels, prompting South Sudan to stop exports, which need to pass through Sudan by pipeline before being shipped from Port Sudan.
South Sudan has alleged its northern neighbor has seized $815 million worth of crude oil since December in compensation for non-payment of fees.
"I have instructed the Ministry of Finance to initiate contingency plans for revenue collection and allocation. This will accelerate the increase in collections of non-oil revenues," he said.
Oil exports account for more than 90% of South Sudan's revenues.
On Friday, South Sudan said it planned to build a new pipeline to the East African coast in conjunction with foreign companies active in its oil sector.
In an interview at the time with China's state-controlled Xinhua news agency, South Sudan Information Minister Barnaba Benjamin said his country had decided to build its first oil refinery and "to rapidly construct a pipeline through eastern Africa, namely via Kenya and Uganda. We expect the pipeline to be completed in 10 months."
State-owned China National Petroleum Corp., India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp. (500312.BY) and Malaysia's Petroliam Nasional Bhd., or Petronas, account for around 90% of the combined oil production in the two countries.
South Sudan became an independent country in July after decades of civil war. It accounts for around 75% of the two countries' normal joint oil output of around 500,000 barrels a day.
Kiir said late Monday that Sudan had built a spur pipeline to divert 120,000 barrels a day of South Sudanese oil to its local refineries in its capital, Khartoum.
Sudanese government officials were quoted in the local media as saying that Sudan was trying to recover unpaid transit fees from South Sudan since its session in July last year.
The two sides are expected to resume talks over transit fees in Ethiopia in the coming days. Previous talks have broken down several times in the past.
"We will continue to do everything possible to resolve the impasse with Sudan and to restore the flow of South Sudan crude oil. We remain in intensive discussions, in coordination with the African Union and our allies, to arrive at an agreement that is fair to both parties" Kirr said.
The chairman of the African Union commission, Jean Ping said in a statement separately that the AU was concerned that recent developments are threatening to bring the relations of the two countries to a point of breakdown.
"These reciprocal unilateral measures threaten grave damage to the economic prospects of both countries and relations between them," he said.
Copyright © 2012 Dow Jones Newswires
South Sudan will try to boost non-oil revenue after it shut its own oil production and halted shipments over a dispute with Sudan over oil transit fees, the South Sudan president said late Monday.
In a national address, President Salva Kiir said the dispute with Sudan had reached "unacceptable" levels, prompting South Sudan to stop exports, which need to pass through Sudan by pipeline before being shipped from Port Sudan.
South Sudan has alleged its northern neighbor has seized $815 million worth of crude oil since December in compensation for non-payment of fees.
"I have instructed the Ministry of Finance to initiate contingency plans for revenue collection and allocation. This will accelerate the increase in collections of non-oil revenues," he said.
Oil exports account for more than 90% of South Sudan's revenues.
On Friday, South Sudan said it planned to build a new pipeline to the East African coast in conjunction with foreign companies active in its oil sector.
In an interview at the time with China's state-controlled Xinhua news agency, South Sudan Information Minister Barnaba Benjamin said his country had decided to build its first oil refinery and "to rapidly construct a pipeline through eastern Africa, namely via Kenya and Uganda. We expect the pipeline to be completed in 10 months."
State-owned China National Petroleum Corp., India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp. (500312.BY) and Malaysia's Petroliam Nasional Bhd., or Petronas, account for around 90% of the combined oil production in the two countries.
South Sudan became an independent country in July after decades of civil war. It accounts for around 75% of the two countries' normal joint oil output of around 500,000 barrels a day.
Kiir said late Monday that Sudan had built a spur pipeline to divert 120,000 barrels a day of South Sudanese oil to its local refineries in its capital, Khartoum.
Sudanese government officials were quoted in the local media as saying that Sudan was trying to recover unpaid transit fees from South Sudan since its session in July last year.
The two sides are expected to resume talks over transit fees in Ethiopia in the coming days. Previous talks have broken down several times in the past.
"We will continue to do everything possible to resolve the impasse with Sudan and to restore the flow of South Sudan crude oil. We remain in intensive discussions, in coordination with the African Union and our allies, to arrive at an agreement that is fair to both parties" Kirr said.
The chairman of the African Union commission, Jean Ping said in a statement separately that the AU was concerned that recent developments are threatening to bring the relations of the two countries to a point of breakdown.
"These reciprocal unilateral measures threaten grave damage to the economic prospects of both countries and relations between them," he said.
Copyright © 2012 Dow Jones Newswires
No comments:
Post a Comment