http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5089558/Saudis: Militants holding hostages
American among 16 dead in oil company attacks
MSNBC News Services
Updated: 2:36 p.m. ET May 29, 2004KHOBAR, Saudi Arabia - Saudi security forces battled militants holding hostages in an upscale expatriate housing complex after a shooting rampage on oil company offices that keft as many as 16 dead, including one American.
A police officer on the scene told The Associated Press the attackers were surrounded on the sixth floor of a high-rise building in the Oasis, a housing complex, and had "people with them," meaning hostages. The officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, could not say how many hostages were being held.
A senior manager of the complex said 50 hostages were being held, among them Americans, Italians and Arabs. The manager spoke on condition of anonymity.
Reports of casualties varied, but sources at the scene told NBC News 16 people were killed. Crown Prince Abdullah, who effectively rules Saudi Arabia because King Fahd is ailing, said "those killed are about 10 -- Saudis and non-Saudis."
The attack was the second on oil industry targets in the kingdom this month. The U.S. Embassy reiterated a call to American citizens to leave the oil-rich country, while the Saudi oil minister planned to meet with representatives from Western oil companies later Saturday to discuss the situation.
Security forces driven back
There had been earlier reports that security officials had stormed the compound and the hostages were freed, but area residents said they had heard the security forces had been driven off by grenades and were awaiting reinforcements.
A report carried by the official Saudi Press Agency, attributed to an unidentified senior Interior Ministry official, said four militants fired randomly at a company and at a residential compound at about 7:30 a.m. (0430 GMT), then entered a residential compound "where the security forces surrounded them in one of the buildings. They are currently being dealt with."
The three sites hit in Khobar, 400 kilometers (250 miles) northeast of Riyadh, the capital, were a compound of offices and housing for Apicorp, the investment arm of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Companies; the Petroleum Center building that contained offices for various international oil-related companies; and the Oasis residential compound, a luxurious, walled expatriate community on the Gulf.
Reuters quoted witnesses who said the militants tied the body of a Briton, an Apicorp employee, to a car and dragged it for more than a mile before dumping it near a bridge.
Apicorp said three of its employees were among the dead.
Among the other companies in the compounds are Royal Dutch/Shell Group, Total SA and Saudi Aramco; Lukoil Holdings of Russia; and China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec. Shell spokesman Simon Buerck and a Saudi oil industry official, Yahya Shinawi, said employees from those companies were safe.
Additional companies believed to be in the compounds included Schlumberger and INOVx, both based in Houston, and Aveva, of Cambridge, England. There was no immediate word on their employees.
Saudi Arabia relies heavily on 6 million expatriate workers to run its oil industry and other sectors. Many Western energy corporations have offices in Khobar, which is the center of Saudi Arabia's oil industry and where state-owned energy giant Saudi Arabian Oil Co. -- better known as Saudi Aramco -- has its headquarters.
Concern over whether Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, can protect its oil industry from terrorists were partly blamed for recent oil price spikes to new highs.
This is not a good thing.. Watch oil spike on Monday... More of these and we will see $50 per barrel ... Then its time to reasses drilling in Alaska
