Iraqi engineers and US soldiers have been struggling to repair Iraq's main oil export pipeline after two attacks by saboteurs last week set it ablaze.
Mr Paul Bremer, the US governor of Iraq, said yesterday that Iraq was losing $7 million a day because of the sabotage of the export pipeline to Turkey.
The pipeline reopened last Wednesday but was shut down two days later after a blaze erupted. A second fire broke out nearby late on Saturday.
Iraq's acting oil minister has said saboteurs attacked the pipeline with explosives. A US military spokeswoman said one of the fires may have been caused by leaked oil from the pipeline being set ablaze. Officials say it could be two weeks before the pipeline is working again.
Widespread looting of electricity cables, as well as sabotage of oil pipelines and breakdowns of decrepit equipment, have caused chronic power and fuel shortages across southern Iraq.
Exports from southern oil fields have been badly affected by frequent power cuts in a further blow to reconstruction efforts, which need billions of dollars of oil revenue to fund them.
US officials say supporters of fugitive dictator Saddam Hussein are behind acts of sabotage on oil and water pipelines.
A Danish soldier died over the weekend when his patrol tried to arrest looters who were stealing copper power cables west of the southern city of Basra. A military spokesman in Basra said it was possible the soldier had been killed by accident by another member of the patrol.
In Saddam's home town of Tikrit, a US Army spokesman said two American soldiers were wounded on Sunday when their convoy was shot at just north of the town.