BAGHDAD, July 4: Saboteurs attacked the oil pipeline linking Iraq's northern and southern fields on Sunday, a day after they hit another pipeline that cut exports by half, officials and witnesses said.

Columns of smoke were rising hundreds of metres from a section of the strategic pipeline in the Hawijat al-Fallujah area, some 80 km southwest of Baghdad.

Industry insiders say northern crude was being secretly pumped through the pipeline for export through two offshore southern terminals. Northern crude is usually pumped through a pipeline to Turkey, but sabotage has forced Iraq to divert flows south.

Exports from the southern terminals, which account for all of Iraq's oil exports, fell to 960,000 barrels per day on Saturday after saboteurs blew a hole in one of two pipelines feeding them.

Iraq used to export around two million bpd before the attack on the southern pipeline on Saturday.

The attack on the smaller of two pipelines feeding two offshore terminals stopped operations at the Khor al-Amya terminal and restricted flows to the bigger Basra terminal, from where most Iraqi oil is exported.

Flows to tankers at the Basra terminal, formerly known as Mina al-Bakr, were running at 41,000 barrels per hour.

The tanker Stena Congress was loading at 31,000 barrels per hour and the Astro Cassiopeia at 11,000 barrels per hour.

Flows to Basra platforms were running at 70,000 barrels per hour before the attack, which blew a hole in the 42-inch pipeline running through the Faw Peninsula, despite security that was stepped up following similar attacks last month.

Iraqi exports are dependent on the Gulf route. Attacks on the two southern pipelines and other oil installations have stopped exports several times this year.

Senior Iraqi security official Ahmad al-Khafaji told Reuters last week that sabotage against oil installations would continue unless neighbouring countries helped stop the infiltration of the foreign militants alleged to be behind the attacks.

Progress in stopping sabotage on a network of domestic and export pipelines stretching for thousands of kilometres will be slow otherwise, Khafaji said. -Reuters