Eric Watkins
Senior Correspondent

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 26 -- Some 1.7 million bbl of Azeri crude were loaded aboard two tankers at Turkey's Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, the first transfer since the closure of the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline on Aug.5 due to an explosion and fire.

In addition to the disruption in the Turkish sector, operation of the BTC line and other export outlets for Azeri oil across Georgia were shut down due to hostilities in early August between Russian and Georgian military forces.

As head of the BTC consortium BP PLC operates the BTC line that transports oil from Azerbaijan's Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli fields complex to world markets. It transported 670,000 b/d in 2007 and plans throughput of 840,000 b/d in 2008 and 1 million b/d in 2009.

The Russian incursion into Georgia raised fears over the security of the trans-Caucasus as an energy corridor for oil and gas from the Caspian region, as well as from countries of Central Asia, such as Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.