Suicide attacks on Basra oil supplies

Suicide bombers tonight used terrifying new tactics to strike at Iraq’s vital oil installations close to the British held city of Basra.

Three boats, manned by suicide bombers, exploded, one near the Al Bakra oil platform and two near oil tankers seven miles off-shore from the Iraq’s second city.

Basra has already suffered a wave of violence this week with 74 killed and hundreds injured, in suicide attacks blamed on al-Qaida.

Now terrorists have used a new tactic in striking at the country’s vital oil lifeline.

It is believed to be the first time since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 that terror groups have used suicide ships for maritime attacks.

There was no immediate word on casualties from the latest blasts.

Today’s first blast came at 4.30pm Irish time when a coalition warship patrolling the Gulf sighted a small boat near the oil platform, according to British military spokesman Captain Hisham H. Halawi.

The warship sent a team to the boat, but when they boarded it, the boat exploded, according the spokesman.

Almost simultaneously the other boats exploded alongside two oil tankers near the Abbott oil facility south of Iraq’s main port, Umm Qasr.

The Al Bakra oil rig, also known as the Al Basra oil rig, lies seven miles off- shore south of the Iran/Iraq border.

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman said the oil rig did not sustain any damage.

Pro-Saddam loyalists have in the past sabotaged oil pipelines and wells causing vast fires.

The blasts appear to be copycats of earlier maritime attacks on western interests.

An explosives-laden boat rammed the destroyer USS Cole, off Yemen in October 2000, killing 17 American sailors.

And on October 6, 2002, a boat rammed a French oil tanker off the coast of Yemen and exploded, killing one crewman.

Both those attacks were blamed on Osama bin Laden’s terror network group.