Page 11 - DMEA Week 09 2022.indd

DMEA FUELS DMEA

Yemen’s fuel crisis worsens

as blockades continue

MIDDLE EAST THE Yemen Petroleum Co. (YPC) this week said and prompting Riyadh’s intervention.
that the country’s fuel shortage is now at its most Fighting between government forces with
acute since civil unrest and conflict between Saudi and Emirati backing and the Houthis
groups backed by a Saudi-led coalition and on has centred around Shabwa and neighbouring
the opposite side by Iran. Ma’rib, to the west, which are home to the major-
Speaking to local media, YPC spokesman ity of the country’s oil and gas reserves.
Essam al-Mutawakel said that queues for gaso- Yemen is home to around 3bn barrels of oil
line are stretching to more than 3 km in several of and roughly 17 trillion cubic feet (481bn cubic
the country’s provinces, noting that the shortage metres) of gas. Oil production peaked at 441,000
is now the worst it has been since fighting broke barrels per day in 2001, but had fallen to around
out almost seven years ago. 150,000 bpd by 2014, then dropped to just 18,000
Al-Mutawakel blamed Saudi forces for block- bpd in 2016 as IOCs put their operations under
ing fuel carriers from entering Yemen’s port of force majeure.
Hodeidah. In January, the UAE-backed al-Amal-
He said that despite the vessels having been iqa (Giants) Brigade announced that it had
inspected by the United Nations and receiving reclaimed Shabwa from the Houthis following a
international clearance, they are being inter- 10-day assault.
cepted and re-routed to Saudi Arabia’s southern With the conflict focusing on Ma’rib and
port of Jazan. Shabwa, production from the Masila fields to
“We always wonder about the benefit of the east began to recover more quickly than the
granting the oil tankers UN permits, and [at the other main assets and in 2020, the oil ministry
same time] the justifications of the acts of piracy said that production had risen to around 55,000
committed by the aggression’s coalition against bpd, noting that infrastructure improvements
them in international waters,” he said, adding could open up an additional 20,000-25,000 bpd.
that one such vessel had been prevented from Given the fluctuations in production and
reaching Hodeidah earlier that day. issues with supply routes, the population hub
Over the past decade the Iran-backed Houthi in the west of the country has become reliant
militia has expanded its reach beyond Sa’dah in on imported fuel, with the 150,000 bpd Aden
the far north-west, along the border with Saudi, refinery having been taken offline completely at
progressing south and east, taking the capital various stages in the conflict owing to risk, then
Sana’a in 2014, resulting in the ongoing civil war attacks.™

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