Dubai
\nOil prices rose on Friday and were set for weekly gains because of renewed fears of supply disruptions from the key Middle East \u200bproducing region after renewed fighting between the US and Iran this week curtailed shipping \u200cin the Strait of Hormuz.
\nBrent futures were up 19 cents, or 0.25%, to $76.49 a barrel by 0319 GMT. US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude gained 19 cents, or 0.26%, to $72.27.
\nFor the week, Brent was set for a gain of \u200babout 6% and WTI was headed for a 5% increase.
\n\u201cPrices have backed off the mid-week \u200bhighs, but there is still a substantial risk premium as Hormuz transits are back to a near-standstill with no clear signs on when normal reopening might resume,\u201d said Vandana Hari, \u200bfounder of oil market analysis provider Vanda Insights.
\n\u201cHowever, it looks like market confidence in the US and \u200bIran returning to diplomacy to resolve the issue is capping the upside,\u201d Hari added.
\nIranian armed forces launched attacks on US military infrastructure in Gulf states on Thursday following US strikes on Iran\u2019s southern coastal and eastern provinces, further \u200bstraining a three-week-old ceasefire.
\nSeparately, Iranian media reported multiple explosions across southern Iran, including Bushehr, where one of \u200bthe country\u2019s nuclear plants is located.
\nThe renewed fighting came the day that Iran buried its slain supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali \u200cKhamenei, the culmination of a week of mass funeral processions and rallies. Khamenei was killed on the first day of the war on February 28.
\nThe renewed fighting has delayed the full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which carried about 20% of daily global oil and gas supplies before the war.
\nTanker traffic through the strait on Thursday \u200bwas at a near \u200bstandstill, according to ship-tracking data, as vessel owners assessed the risk from the latest strikes, which started after Iran hit a Qatari LNG ship exiting the waterway near Oman.
\n\u200bStill, US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he did not think the \u200bwar would restart because of the new fighting and that \u201canything that happens is going to be over very quickly.\u201d
\n\u201cDespite the US ramping up attacks on military sites in Iran, the market drew some reassurance from the Trump administration\u2019s decision to avoid targeting Iranian \u200benergy infrastructure,\u201d said Daniel Hynes, senior commodity strategist for ANZ \u200bbank.
\n\u201cThis was aided by comments from President Trump, who said he doesn\u2019t expect a return to a full-scale conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dubai Oil prices rose on Friday and were set for weekly gains because of renewed fears of supply disruptions from the key Middle East \u200bproducing region after renewed fighting between the US and Iran this week curtailed shipping \u200cin the Strait of Hormuz. Brent futures were up 19 cents, or 0.25%, to $76.49 a barrel …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":69407,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100132"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100143,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100132\/revisions\/100143"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}