Report says ExxonMobil to resume full operation in Aceh next month

State oil and gas firm Pertamina expects Exxonmobil to resume full operations in the restive province of Aceh early next month, a report said Thursday.

"We are estimating it to be in early October 2001," the head of Pertamina's production-sharing management department, Siddick Nitikusuma, was quoted by Serambi daily as saying.

He told the Aceh newspaper that security had improved in gasfields where the US giant operates, citing the resumption of operations at three of its five clusters or gas collection centres.

Nitikusuma said operations at two clusters resumed early this month. A third began operating Wednesday with an initial output of 50 million cubic feet (1.5 million cubic meters) of gas per day.

A spokesman for Nitikusuma's department said output from this cluster would be raised to 200 million cubic feet later this week.

Exxonmobil spokesperson Julia Tumengkol told AFP it could not give an exact timeframe for the resumption of full operations in Aceh.

"We are not able to confirm a definite date because we do not know what is going to happen along the way. What we can say is that we continue to prepare for resuming activity while continuing to monitor the security situation there," Tumengkol said.

She said Exxonmobil is continuing to prepare for the other clusters to resume operations but this involved maintenance and repair work.

ExxonMobil shut down operations in Aceh in March citing hijackings, arson and kidnapping threats to its personnel by separatist rebels of the Free Aceh Movement.

The company, which resumed limited operations in July, feeds liquefied natural gas to the huge Arun plant.

Some 90 percent is supplied to PT Arun for export to Japan and South Korea. The other 10 percent goes to two fertiliser firms and a pulp firm operating in the area.(*)