The cause of the breach was unknown, but there was no suggestion it was sabotage, a spokesman told AP, and exports were unaffected, the spokesman said. Reuters quickly corrected the account, posting a story saying a sabotage attack on the 42-in mainline in southern Iraq had cut the country’s southern exports to 960,000brl/d. Iraq had been exporting around 1.8 million brl/d from two offshore Gulf terminals before the weekend sabotage. The attacks on the 42-in pipeline stopped operations at the Khor al-Amaya terminal and cut the export flow rate at the Basra terminal, formerly known as Mina al-Bakr, to 40,000 barrels per hour compared to up to 70,000 before the attack. The unaffected 48-in southern mainline continued to operate. On 4 July, saboteurs attacked the oil pipeline linking Iraq’s northern and southern oil fields. Columns of smoke were rising hundreds of feet in the air from a section of the strategic pipeline near the Hawijat al-Fallujah area southwest of Baghdad. Service on the sabotaged 42-in southern pipeline resumed on 7 July following repairs and testing.