Zambia's sole Indeni Oil Refinery has suspended petrol-refining operations after a fire, Managing Director Luis Urbano said, in a move that will put further pressure on the country's lifeblood copper mining, according to Reuters. "There was a product that fell into the furnace and caused an explosion. As a result of this we've suspended fuel refining," Urbano told reporters at the refinery near the copperbelt city of Ndola. He gave no further details. The Indeni Oil Refinery produces more than 350,000 litres of petrol per day -- enough to meet Zambia's daily consumption. It also produces more than 1 million litres of diesel fuel, although this had not been affected, the refinery said. Indeni, co-owned by French oil major Total and the Zambian government, has been plagued by breakdowns because of obsolete equipment and was shut for almost four weeks in September before reopening in mid-October. The closure led to severe fuel shortages that forced Nkana copper smelter, owned by a unit of Vedanta Resources and Mufulira smelter -- owned by a unit of Canada's First Quantum Minerals and Swiss firm Glencore International, to drastically scale down production. The fuel shortages also forced thousands of commuters to walk to work and sent retail petrol prices spiralling. There was no immediate reaction from the mining smelters. Copper mining is Zambia's leading source of hard currency and a major employer in this southern African country.
