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Inherent risks associated with oil work

HOUSTON, Aug. 13 (UPI) -- The most likely place for an attack on the energy sector or its workers is at sea off the coast of East Africa, a media compilation finds.

Energy reporting website Rigzone said the most likely place for a kidnapping of an oil and gas worker is at sea. It found there were 138 incidents of piracy around the world during the first six months of the year.

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"Many of these incidents involve workers and sailors on platform supply vessels, oil tankers and occasionally oil platforms themselves," it said.

The report assessed the Top 5 trouble spots in terms of acts of violence targeting the energy industry. Apart from Columbia, all of the threat areas were in the Middle East and North Africa.

The report said the oil and natural gas industry exposes itself to an increased security risk because new and unexplored reserves are often in some of the world's most dangerous places.

It singled out Iraq and Nigeria as countries with a particularly high risk for the energy sector.

Militants sympathetic to al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb stormed the In Amenas natural gas facility in eastern Algeria in January. Foreign workers with BP and Norwegian energy company Statoil were among the dead in the attack.

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