Syria blast hits oil pipeline near Homs
As an explosion hits oil production in the restive western city of Homs, a Syria expert tells Channel 4 News who could be behind the attack.
The blast, which hit a pipeline carrying oil to a refinery in the city at the heart of the urprising in Syria, took place in the early hours of Thursday and is the third attack on a pipeline in the past year.
Activists who uploaded video to a social media website (which purports to show raging flames and black smoke rising from site) say it was the work of a government elements seeking to pin the blame on the protest movement.
“This is the main pipeline that feeds the Homs refinery,” said Rami Abdulrahman of the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Blame
David Hartwell, senior analyst for the Middle East North Africa region at IHS Jane’s gave Channel 4 News his analysis of the situation: “Homs is the hotbed of the uprising so we perhaps shouldn’t be too surprised it’s happened here. It’s also where the Free Syrian Army (FSA) is based.
“The official Syrian SANA agency is blaming terrorists for the attack so that seems to indicate it could be the opposition. The FSA made an agreement last week with the opposition umbrella group, the Syrian National Council, that they would stop attacking the Syrian army so perhaps the opposition could see the pipeline as a legitimate target.”
But he thinks there is limited damage that can be done to such infrastructural targets: “The thing is, Syria doesn’t have many strategic industries to target, about the only one is oil.
“Syria also doesn’t have that much oil and that is also subject to EU sanctions on about 90 per cent of it. Despite this it’s likely the attack will only be an inconvenience rather than a major headache.”
Watch Foreign Affairs Correspondent Jonathan Miller’s report from the birthplace of Syria’s uprising
Uprising pushes on
The activist network also reported seven people killed in Homs on Thursday by snipers and in “random” shootings. Popular protests began in Syria nine months ago, inspired by the wave of revolt across the Arab world.
As for the future of the revolt, David Hartwell from IHS Jane’s says it is unlikely to lead to the overthrow of President Assad‘s regime in the near future, but should some elements come together, the government may find its survival threatened: “I don’t think anyone expected the protests to last for so long.
“We have heard that Iran is propping up the Syrian pound but Iran has its own economic problems to deal with because of sanctions so how long that can go on remains to be seen.
“The regime is a long way from being toppled but if the civil unrest and the economic pressures continue and Assad starts to lose the support of the merchant classes, that is going to cause big problems for the government.”