South Sudan oil revenue up despite fighting: Khartoum

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All of South Sudan's oil exports pass through pipelines to Port Sudan in the north, so the Khartoum government is well placed to assess the economic impact of the conflict, much of which has focused on the south's oil-producing Unity and Upper Nile states.

"The business of oil is going on," Sudanese Information Minister Ahmed Bilal Osman told AFP.

"The South is getting more revenue now," with a spinoff increase in transit fees for Sudan as well because a greater volume of crude is flowing towards the Port Sudan export terminal on the Red Sea coast, he said.

Fierce fighting in the south's Upper Nile and Unity states between loyalists of South Sudan President Salva Kiir and his rival former vice president Riek Machar has prompted foreign oil firms to withdraw many of their staff.

But Osman said that more southern oil was being pumped through the export pipeline to the north "because they want to empty the tankers there in the field".

The South became independent less than three years ago under a 2005 peace deal that ended 23 years of civil war.

It separated with roughly 75 percent of the 470,000 barrels per day of crude produced by the formerly united country, while refineries and export pipelines stayed under Khartoum's jurisdiction.

Oil production formed more than 95 percent of South Sudan's fledgling economy before the fighting began one month ago.

Fees paid by South Sudan to send its oil for export through northern pipelines are a significant revenue-earner for cash-strapped Sudan.

"There is an increase" in fees to Khartoum as a result of the higher volume of crude moving to the export terminal, Osman said.

A South Sudanese embassy official confirmed that oil revenue has risen and the flow of southern crude to Port Sudan has increased.

"The quantity, I'm not sure," the official said.

South Sudan has been gripped by violence since December 15, when clashes broke out between army units loyal to Kiir and those supporting Machar, the deputy he ousted last year.

According to the United Nations, about 400,000 civilians have fled their homes as the violence has spiralled into ethnic killings between members of Kiir's Dinka people - the country's largest group - and Machar's Nuer.

Up to 10,000 people are believed to have been killed in the fighting, aid sources and analysts say.

Source: AFP