Staff Reporter
Islamabad
Prices of petroleum products are likely to go up by up to Rs12 in coming days owing to an increase in international market following an attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure last week, slashing the Arab kingdom’s oil production by half.
The attack that shut five per cent of global crude output has triggered the biggest surge in oil prices since 1991.
Europe’s benchmark Brent crude surged by 20 per cent and US counterpart WTI by 15 per cent as commodities trading got underway and after President Donald Trump warned that the US was “locked and loaded” to respond to the attacks that Washington blamed on Iran.
Tehran has rejected the claim but Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen, where a Saudi-led coalition is bogged down in a five-year war, claimed Saturday’s strikes on two plants owned by state energy giant Aramco.
Trump says US ‘locked and loaded’ to respond to Saudi oil attack
Pakistan’s energy supply is also at a risk due to mounted tensions with India over revocation of the autonomous status of Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
Pakistan faces a wide gap in energy demand and supply as it relies mainly on crude oil and petroleum product supplies.
POL prices are likely to be increased by Rs5 to Rs8 from October 1 and Rs10 to Rs12 in the following month, sorces said.
They said the impact of hike in crude oil price would be felt by the masses in November according to local mechanism used to determine prices of petroleum products in the country.
The sources, however said the government may reduce the taxes in a bid to lessen the burden of increased POL prices on the masses. The giant Saudi plant that was struck cleans crude oil of impurities, a necessary step before it can be exported and fed into refineries. The attack cut Saudi output by 5.7 million barrels a day, or around half.
