April 3, 1999
Web posted at: 5:54 a.m. EST (1054 GMT)

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraq's state-run media claimed Saturday that Western warplanes had bombed and destroyed a key control center of an oil pumping station used for exports.

The newspaper reports said the center targeted in the airstrikes was at the main pumping station used by Iraq to export oil via the southern Iraqi oil terminal of Mina-al- Bakr.

An Iraqi oil ministry spokesman said oil exports via the terminal resumed on Friday after setting up an emergency center at reduced levels.

The spokesman said that workers for the Southern Oil Company set up an emergency system to load oil tankers with crude from the terminal at limited quantities.

The oil ministry took reporters from Western television networks and news agencies to a site on Saturday which was said to have been destroyed by Western warplanes.

The oil-for-food deal signed with the United Nations, allows Iraq to sell $5.26 billion worth of oil over six months to buy food, medicines and other humanitarian needs for Iraqis suffering from U.N. sanctions imposed for Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

Earlier, an Iraqi military spokesman said Western warplanes also bombed a service installation in the southern port city of Basra later on Friday.

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Air strikes against Iraqi military targets began in December after Baghdad decided to attack U.S. and British jets patrolling the no-fly zones in the north and south of Iraq, but a 12-day lull preceded Friday's reported bombing.

Iraq exports half of the 2.2 million barrels per day it pumps to international markets under the oil pact from Mina-al- Bakr terminal. The remaining half is being exported via the twin Iraq-Turkey pipeline which also came under Western bombardment last month. Exports via the pipeline were suspended for three days after that raid.

Late last month an explosion hit the Turkish section of the pipeline which forced the suspension of exports for a day.

On Friday, Iraqi officials claimed two houses were also destroyed in the strike.

Aircraft -- including F-14s, F-16s and Tornados -- carried out 18 sorties from Kuwait and 33 from Saudi Arabia, the official Iraqi News Agency said, quoting an unidentified spokesman for the Iraq's Air Defenses Command.

It said another wave of jets conducted 31 sorties about eight hours later in four provinces, including Basra.

Lt. Cmdr. Ernest Duplessis, spokesman at U.S. Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Florida., denied the earlier attacks. But he confirmed the later raid, in which he said three F-16s struck a communication facility and a radio relay station in Basra.

Duplessis denied that attacks from allied warplanes destroyed the two houses.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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