March 21, 2006	Tuesday	Safar 20, 1427

LONDON, March 20: World oil prices slipped on Monday as high US crude stocks weighed on the market, but falls were tempered by news of another oil pipeline attack in Nigeria, dealers said.

New York’s main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in April, lost 47 cents to $62.30 per barrel in pit trading.

In London, the price of Brent North Sea crude for May delivery dipped 60 cents to $62.90 per barrel in electronic deals.

Fresh unrest over the weekend in Nigeria – Africa’s largest crude producer — had jangled market nerves over global supplies.

Prices had risen earlier Monday on news that Nigerian militants blew up an oil pipeline operated by a subsidiary of Italian oil group ENI.

That cut off some 67,000 barrels per day of output and brought Nigeria’s total outage to 622,000 bpd or 25 per cent of the country’s entire crude output.—AFP