SERBIAN OIL SUPPLIES: SOURCES AND SUPPLIES

Created: 1/1/1992

OCR scan of the original document, errors are possible

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Serbian Oil Supplies: Sources and Supplies

The JNA has not restricted military operationsay which would suggest it has immediate worries about the exhaustion of its fuel supplies. Serbia's normal supplies of oil have been disrupted through the cut-off of tho Adria pipeline, and loss of access to the ports of Split and Rijeka. Serbia may be able to procure oilariety of sources. The federal government has access to small domestic supplies from Vojvodina and has recently9 million tonnesillion barrels} from this source. Lack of sizable domestic reserves, however, has forced Belgrade to look to foreign suppliers, such as the Soviet Union, Libya, Angola, the PRC, and Iran, to meet its needs. We estimate that Serbia ia meeting one-fourth of its oil needs from combined domestic and foreign sources.

Even though sources do exist, transporting oil to Serbia poses serious difficulties. The three possible routes are:

-up the Danube through Romania by barge

-by rail from Greece through Macedonia

-by tanker to the Montenegrin port of Bar from where it is transported by land to Serbia

Few of these alternatives are very viable. hortage of oil barges and frequent disruptions in Danube river trafficesult of fighting, limits0 tonnes per0 barrels) the amount of oil which can be brought by river. The utility of the port of Bar is limitedhortage of tanker trucks, the existence of only one rail line, and inadequate roads linking Bar with Serbia. Optimistically the railway might be able toonnesarrels). Macedonia has, therefore, becomeprimary conduit for oil supplies; its refinery in Skopje is providing small supplies to both Bosnia-Hercegovina and Serbia. It recently0 barrels) of oil probably from Thessaloniki.

No estimate of the current fuel reserves of theare available. Before the conflict, fullten million barrels of storage for normaland an additional war reserve capacity of eight fuel reserves were

keptoercwiii uixw. ine JNA, however, has lost an unknown but probably large share of its reserves previously kept in Croatia and almost certainly has had to draw on

other reserves to support ongoing operations Total

s^riifers rf*Ibon

reportedly are six hours longdespite reduced consumption as men deploy to the frit? "

Original document.

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