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(Continued from page 27)
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As Iran tensions fester, United Arab Emirates nears start of oil pipeline to dodge key strait
• FUJAIRAH, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- By night, the lights of dozens of ships anchored off this eastern Emirati port create the mirage of a far-off city at sea.
• The crowded anchorage reflects Fujairah's rise as one of the world's busiest maritime refueling stations. Soon it will also become a vital new exit route for Arabian crude oil destined for world markets.
• The United Arab Emirates is nearing completion of a pipeline through the mountainous sheikdom that will allow it to reroute the bulk of its oil exports around the Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf, the path for a fifth of the world's oil supply.
• Iran has repeatedly threatened to close the strategically sensitive waterway, which is patrolled by Iranian and U.S. warships, in retaliation for ramped-up Western sanctions over Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
• That threat has raised worries among Gulf countries that conflicts could block the route to market for their most lucrative resource. But only the UAE and Oman have coastlines on Indian Ocean side of the strait that would enable them to go around the chokepoint by land. Saudi Arabia also can avoid Hormuz by shipping its Gulf fields' oil production out of its Red Sea ports, but it would have to increase the capacity of those ports and of pipelines running across the breadth of the country to handle its total output.
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'Drug' O'Neill nickname sticks, despite others in Belmont field with history of violations
• LOS ANGELES (AP) -- The affable man with the horse that may become the first Triple Crown winner in more than a generation can't seem to outrun his unflattering nickname: "Drug" O'Neill.
• But Doug O'Neill is far from the only trainer in Saturday's Belmont Stakes with a history of improperly medicated horses. The Associated Press reviewed the histories of all 11 trainers with horses in the race and found that 10 had at least one violation of medication regulations set by state racing boards.
• O'Neill has been under the most scrutiny because his colt, I'll Have Another, won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes and is the 4-5 favorite to add the Belmont and complete the first Triple Crown in 34 years.
• "We had the black cloud before he won the Derby," D. Wayne Lukas, the elder (Continued on page 29)
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