Mexican troops to guard energy sites

[robertpaulsen]

Source: LA Times

Mexican troops to guard energy sites
Guerrilla attacks on pipelines have caused fuel shortages for factories.
By Héctor Tobar, Times Staff Writer
July 13, 2007


MEXICO CITY — Mexican President Felipe Calderon has dispatched a new 5,000-strong elite military unit to guard strategic sites, including oil refineries and hydroelectric dams, in the wake of guerrilla attacks on pipelines operated by the national oil and gas company, Pemex, according to news reports Thursday.

Business leaders said as many as 1,000 factories and other businesses in the Guanajuato-Queretaro region of central Mexico have been forced to shut down or reduce operations this week because of fuel shortages caused by attacks this month.

The leftist Popular Revolutionary Army, or EPR, claimed responsibility for the attacks Tuesday, saying they were in retaliation for the disappearance of two of their militants last year in the southern state of Oaxaca.

The EPR communique said the rebels had bombed three pipelines and a switching station in Queretaro and Guanajuato states. The explosions severed natural gas pipelines and a crude oil pipeline that links storage facilities in the Gulf of Mexico port of Poza Rica to a refinery in Salamanca, in Guanajuato, reducing fuel supplies in the region.



Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-pemex13jul13,0,5950315.story?coll=la-home-center

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As production at Cantarell continues to plummet, this is only going to get worse.