(Reuters, 26.Jul.2019) — Colombia’s state-run oil company Ecopetrol said on Friday it halted pumping on the Transandino pipeline after a bombing in southwestern Narino province.
The attack did not produce a crude spill, the company said in a statement, but did dent the pipeline.
It is the fourteenth attack this year on the Transandino. More than 400 illegal valves meant to enable crude theft have also been found on the pipeline in 2019.
There have been dozens of attacks on a variety of Colombian pipelines so far this year.
Although Ecopetrol did not name the group responsible for the attack, the leftist National Liberation Army (ELN) rebels, considered a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, regularly bomb oil infrastructure.
Reporting by Julia Symmes Cobb; Editing by Chris Reese
***