Aug. 15 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc, Europe's second-largest oil company, declined to say when an oil pipeline in eastern Turkey will resume pumping as it continues to assess damage to a section engulfed by fire last week.

BP, its partners and Botas International Ltd., a Turkish pipeline operator, are examining the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline to establish how long repairs will take, Ebru Akdogan, a spokeswoman for BTC Co. in Ankara, said today by phone.

``We don't know the extent of the damage and can't say whether the assessment will finish in a couple of days or not,'' she said.

Turkey's Energy Ministry expects the BTC pipeline, which can carry 1 million barrels a day, to resume operations in a week, spokesman Akif Sam said yesterday. The blaze erupted on the pipe, which links Azerbaijan through Georgia with the Turkish port of Ceyhan, on Aug. 5 after a blast in the Erzincan province.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, said it bombed the link as part of its campaign for autonomy in southeast Turkey. Inspections of fire damage at BTC show no sign the fire was caused by a bomb, Sam said yesterday.

Another pipeline, which passes through Georgia to the Black Sea port of Supsa, is closed for a fourth day because of security concerns, Tamam Bayatly, a BP spokeswoman in Baku, Azerbaijan, said today by phone.

BP, StatoilHydro ASA and partners had to cut production at the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli oil and Shah Deniz natural-gas fields in the Azeri part of the Caspian Sea after halting the BTC and Baku-Supsa pipelines.

Force Majeure

Shippers declared force majeure on exports from the Supsa and Ceyhan ports, a legal clause that exempts them from meeting contracted deliveries because of circumstances beyond their control.

Oil is now only being transported from Azerbaijan through the Baku-Novorossiysk link to the Russian Black Sea coast and in rail cars, Bayatly said. She declined to specify where the rail cars are being directed to.

Rail shipments across Georgia to Black Sea oil terminals were halted after Russian forces seized the central Georgian transport city of Gori, Georgian Economy Minister Eka Sharashidze said yesterday.

Ports Open

All Georgian ports are open for loading, Garsevan Jorbenadze, a Batumi-based ship agent at TeRo Co. Ltd., who arranges for vessels to dock and load, said today. One tanker is loading oil from stockpiles at the port of Supsa, he said.

BP isn't aware of any damage to its pipelines in Georgia, Bayatly said. The South Caucasus natural gas pipeline, which runs parallel to the BTC oil link, is continuing fuel exports to Georgia and Turkey, after it resumed pumping yesterday following a two-day halt, she said.

Georgia's Sharashidze yesterday said that Baku-Supsa link, which has a daily capacity of more than 100,000 barrels, was struck by Russian missiles. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, the deputy head of Russia's General Staff, denied bombing the pipeline.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Aug. 12 ordered a halt to Russia's offensive in Georgia after six days of fighting. The military conflict in the Caucasus disrupted oil and gas flows in the region, and called into question Georgia's reliability as an energy transit hub.

Turkey had increased imports of gas from Iran and from Russia to compensate for the shortfall from the South Caucasus pipeline, the Energy Ministry said yesterday.

To contact the report for this story: Mark Bentley in Ankara at mbentley3@bloomberg.net Eduard Gismatullin in London at egismatullin@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: August 15, 2008 05:52 EDT