Saudi Arabia shuts the East-West pipeline after drones leave Iraqi soil

Saudi Arabia shut the East-West oil pipeline on Friday after drones launched from Iraqi territory struck pumping stations in the Riyadh and Medina regions. The line is 1,200 kilometres long. It runs from the Abqaiq processing complex near the Gulf to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. Since Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz at the start of the present war, that corridor has carried a growing share of Saudi crude that used to leave the Gulf.

The Ministry of Energy told the Saudi Press Agency the shutdown was a precaution. An official said the attacks caused injuries and damage that was still being assessed. The Foreign Ministry later named the origin: several drones that came from Iraq. It condemned the strikes and said the kingdom would not retaliate for now, at the request of Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi, while reserving the right to protect its facilities and residents.

Iraq confirmed the launch site. Al-Zaidi's office said the drones left a location in Maysan province, which borders Iran, and dismissed the operations commander there. Baghdad condemned the attack on "our brethren in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia" and opened an investigation. On Saturday two security sources told Reuters that Iraq had ordered the Shalamcheh crossing with Iran closed as a precaution and that a wide search for the perpetrators was under way. Other reports said limits were also applied at Al-Shaib, Zurbatiyah and Al-Mundhariyah, while crossings under the Kurdistan Regional Government stayed open. Basra International Airport delayed flights to and from Iran.

The pipeline's importance is mechanical, not rhetorical. Reuters, citing ship-tracking firms and analysts, has put the volume moving through it at 4 to 5 percent of global oil supply. The International Energy Agency has said Saudi shipments through the Red Sea port at the western end more than doubled after Hormuz closed. Pump stations sit beside the pipe itself. U.S. officials told CNN an early analysis found those stations were hit. Copernicus Sentinel-3 images published by Reuters showed black smoke and scorched ground southeast of Medina on 10 and 11 September. A Planet Labs image dated 11 September showed fire damage at an infrastructure site along the same route.

Brent crude briefly touched about $110 a barrel after the news, the New York Times reported, the first move through $100 since July. Diesel in the United States was already at a record national average of $6.06 a gallon on 11 September, according to AAA. The East-West line is the main land bypass Saudi Arabia still controls. With the Houthis now holding Perim Island and the Yemeni Red Sea coast, the western outlet is no longer a quiet alternative. It is one of the last large routes that does not pass a contested strait.

Gulf Cooperation Council Secretary-General Jasem Mohamed Albudaiwi called the attack a threat to Saudi territorial integrity and a breach of international law. Riyadh has not named a militia. Maysan has long hosted armed groups aligned with Iran. The Iraqi government's first public act was to fire a local commander and close a border that pilgrims, traders and militias all use.

Saudi Arabia built the East-West system in the early 1980s so that oil from the Eastern Province could reach the Red Sea if the Gulf were blocked. The design assumption has now been tested twice in one week: first by the Hormuz closure that made the pipe essential, then by drones that hit the pipe itself. Whether flow resumes, and at what volume, will sit in the weekly tanker counts before it sits in any communique.

The next test is operational. If Iraq can show that the launch site is sealed and that similar flights cannot leave Maysan, Riyadh has a reason to keep the pause it granted. If another drone leaves Iraqi ground, the Foreign Ministry's reserved right will be the only sentence left on the table.