Al-Qaeda's Syrian arm is helping to fund its activities by selling the product of oilfields once used to prop up the regime of Bashar al-Assad.
Up to 380,000 barrels of crude oil were previously produced by wells around the city of Raqqa and in the region to its east that are now in rebel hands. Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda off-shoot, is the strongest faction in this part of the country.
Now the group, which has been steadily increasing its control in the region, is selling the crude oil to local wheeler-dealers, who use home-made refineries to produce low-grade gasoline and other fuels for Syrians facing acute shortages.
Their ability to profit from the oil locally, despite international sanctions which have hindered its sale abroad, should be particularly worrying to the European Union, which has voted to ease the embargo but at the same time wants to marginalize the extremist group within the opposition.
In the battle for the future of the Syria, the oil-fields may begin to play an increasingly strategic role. All are in the three provinces closest to Iraq, while the Iraqi border regions are the homeland of the Islamic State of Iraq, as the al-Qaeda off-shoot in that country calls itself. |