UN's oil-for-food program reports large jump in Iraqi exports last week

There was a large jump in Iraqi oil exports last week, the United Nations office overseeing the UN's oil-for-food humanitarian scheme reported Tuesday.

The Office of the Iraq Program (OIP), which released the latest set of figures, said that during the week leading up to March 16, Iraq had shipped a total of 17.9 million barrels of oil for an estimated revenue of 367 million Euros - the largest volume of oil exported in a single week since the start of the program's current phase, which began on December 6.

OIP also reported that UN oil overseers had adopted a new policy to prevent the diversion and discharge of Iraqi oil cargo to a destination other than that authorized in an approved contract.

According to the new policy, the masters of the vessels loading Iraqi oil will now have to sign a notification indicating the authorized destination of the cargo. Any diversion from the authorized destination will be the liability of the shipping company.

The new policy is in response to an incident in February when an oil cargo of two million barrels of Basrah Light destined for the United States was discharged in the Far East, incurring a revenue loss of 8.5 million Euros to the program.

The UN Treasury is in the process of collecting this amount from the buyer through BNP Paribas, at the request of the Iraqi State Oil Marketing Organization, OIP said.