Some 300,000 Liters/Day of Red Fuel Oil Is Being Smuggled from Lebanon to Syria

摘要

Accused of facilitating the daily passage of Syrian road tankers that come to load up with red fuel oil (domestic heating oil) from the storage tanks of the Tripoli and Zahrani refineries, the Lebanese Ministry of Energy and Water has categorically denied these reports, while an oil sector expert has denounced it as a scandal and called for a strike on 28 February. The volume of heating oil reaching Syria is estimated at 300,000 liters/day. Over and beyond the international sanctions that could be imposed against Lebanon, the Syrian road tankers going to load up at Lebanese refineries are operating quite illegally, since this kind of operation has first to be approved by the Cabinet, which it was not.