* Oil falls as China's July crude imports drop
* Russia-Georgia conflict disrupts Caspian oil shipments
* BTC pipeline repair may take two or more weeks
(Updates prices, adds Reuters poll of U.S. inventories)
NEW YORK, Aug 11 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell on Monday as a
drop in crude imports by No. 2 consumer China outweighed
concerns over supply disruptions stemming from the conflict
between Russia and Georgia.
U.S. crude <CLc1> settled down 75 cents at $114.45 a
barrel, after touching a low of $112.72, extending losses that
have dragged oil off a record high above $147 a barrel hit on
July 11. London Brent crude <LCOc1> fell 66 cents to $112.67.
China's crude imports unexpectedly fell 7 percent in July
to a seven-month low in the steepest monthly drop since January
2005, as refiners balked at soaring crude costs amid lagging
domestic fuel prices. []
The drop in Chinese imports added to wider concerns about
demand. Consumption in the United States and other developed
economies has fallen due to high fuel prices.
"I think that sentiment is changing on China -- that it
(demand) might not grow at the same rate that it has in the
past couple of years -- and the figures from this morning
attest to that," said Lehman Brothers oil analyst James
Crandell.
Rising demand from China and other developing economies
sent oil on a six-year rally that drove prices up sevenfold to
their peak in July. Additional buying support this year came
from investors buying oil to hedge against inflation and the
weak dollar.
The dollar has been rallying against the euro since last
week as investors have reassessed the effect of the U.S.
economic slowdown on the rest of the world.[]
Georgia appealed for international intervention on Monday,
and pulled its battered forces back to defend the capital, as
Russian troops moved farther into its territory, ignoring
Western pleas to halt. []
Oil traders have pushed prices down despite the potential
for the conflict to disrupt key transportation links for
Caspian Sea oil producers, including Azerbaijan and
Kazakhstan.
Georgia's oil ports of Supsa and Batumi, which export
Azeri crude, have reduced shipments while the Georgian port of
Poti has been shut. Kazakhstan also stopped shipments of its
crude from Batumi. []
The cutbacks come after a fire in eastern Turkey on the
Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline last week halted loadings of Azeri
Light crude shipped to the Turkish port of Ceyhan.
The blaze was extinguished on Monday and repairs may take
one to two weeks, or longer, a source at the pipeline
consortium said, forcing BP Plc <BP.L> to cut output by at
least 400,000 barrels a day at the Azeri-Chirag Gunashli oil
fields. []
OPEC President Chakib Khelil, speaking on a visit to Iran,
urged members of the oil exporters' group to stick to agreed
targets on output. []
OPEC is overshooting its informal output target, with Saudi
Arabia leading the way after the kingdom pledged to meet rising
demand and help tame runaway oil prices. The producer group
meets on Sept. 9 to decide on future output policy.
A Reuters poll of analysts ahead of weekly U.S. inventory
data due out on Wednesday forecast a 100,000-barrel draw in
crude stocks, a 2.1-million-barrel draw in gasoline
inventories, and a 1.7-million-barrel build in distillates.
[]
(Reporting by Matthew Robinson, Gene Ramos, and Robert
Gibbons in New York, Alastair Sharp and Santosh Menon in
London, Fayen Wong in Perth; Editing by Walter Bagley)
