From January to November, the total profit of China's industrial enterprises with annual sales of more than $724,600 reached $348.78 billion, an increase of 4.9 percent year over year but down 31.8 percentage points compared with the same period last year, the National Bureau of Statistics of China on December 26.

- State-owned and state-controlled firms: $115.72 billion, down 14.5%
- Collective-owned firms: $9.96 billion, up 29.5%
- Share-cooperative firms: $2.43 billion, up 19.2%
- Joint-stock firms: $195.17 billion, up 11.4%
- Foreign-funded firms: $92.38 billion, down 3.1%
- Private firms: $79.64 billion, up 36.6%

Taxes paid totaled $265.42 billion, up 20.7% year over year, and combined revenue totaled $6.37 trillion, up 24.1% year over year. By the end of November the total volume of net receivables totaled $652.26 billion, up 12.3%, and the total value of finished products reached $334.99 billion, up 25%.

Sectors

- Oil and natural gas: up 37.2%
- Coal: up 133.7%
- Iron and steel: down 13.7%
- Architectural materials: up 27.7%
- Chemicals: up 0.2%
- Smelting and pressing of nonferrous metals: down 34.1%
- Special-purpose machinery: up 9.4%
- Transportation equipment: up 15.7%
- Electronic communication equipment: up 1.1%
- Electric power: down 84.1%
- Chemical fibers: down 74.9%

The petroleum processing and coking industries lost $18.26 billion compared with a profit of $3.55 billion in the same period last year.

The supply of cooking gas remains tight for small retailers even as the Energy department’s inspection has so far cleared some suppliers from allegations of hoarding.

In a phone interview, Liquefied Petroleum Gas Marketers Association (LPGMA) President Arnel U. Ty said there are still long queues for the commodity in suppliers’ depots.

He said the supply situation is expected to ease on Saturday with the arrival of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) imports.

The Energy department has ordered during the holiday break an inspection of major and so-called independent LPG retailers to ensure steady supply in the market after small sellers complained of supply lack to meet the holiday demand.

The department has cleared, among others, Petron Corp.’s facility in Bataan province of hoarding after an inspection conducted on Jan. 2.

Col. Felipe Perez of the Presidential Task Force on the Security of Energy Facilities and Enforcement of Laws and Standards said they will also inspect other major suppliers Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp., which sells Shellane, and Total Philippines, Inc., which retails TotalGaz, but he did not indicate a specific date.

"We are looking at inspecting them this month, we can’t do it all at the same time since we lack manpower," Mr. Perez said in an interview at the weekend.

Mr. Ty earlier said the supply lack forced their members to operate only every other day and that this has affected 30% of their operations.

LPGMA members, who operate only in Luzon, control 30% of the market.

Liquigaz, which supplies LPGMA members, earlier said there is enough supply for its customers.

LPGMA members include Pinnacle Gas, Cat Gas, Omni Gas, Nation Gas and Island Gas.

LPG prices remain steady at P380 to P464 per 11-kilogram cyinder tank.

U.S. stocks last week advanced the most since November after fewer Americans filed for jobless claims and oil's biggest weekly increase in two decades lifted energy stocks.

Marathon Oil and Baker Hughes led energy producers, climbing more than 15 percent as the price of crude oil reached $46.34 a barrel, the highest in a month. SanDisk staged the steepest rally among technology companies in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index, adding 21 percent as investors speculated that it may be acquired. The S&P 500 gained 6.8 percent during the holiday-shortened week, to 931.80. The Dow Jones industrial average added 6.1 percent, to 9034.69. The Nasdaq composite index rose 6.7 percent to 1632.21.

"If we get some letup in risk aversion, we could easily see double-digit" percentage gains in U.S. stocks this year, said E. William Stone, chief investment strategist at PNC Wealth Management. "We only know two things: Typically, the market moves before the economy does, and valuations are reasonable."

More than $30 trillion was erased from global equity markets in 2008. The S&P 500 plunged 38 percent, the most since 1937, as the economy entered a recession and the biggest financial firms lost more than $1 trillion on subprime-related loans and securities.

Energy stocks increased the most among 10 S&P 500 industry groups, jumping 9.6 percent. Companies that rely on growing consumer spending rose 8.4 percent, the second-biggest gain. Industrial, financial and technology companies advanced more than 7 percent and every group added at least 3.8 percent.

Crude futures gained 23 percent last week, the most since August 1986, as the conflict in Gaza increased concern that Middle East supplies would be cut and Russia curbed natural-gas shipments to Ukraine. Oil fell 54 percent last year, the first annual drop since 2001.

The Labor Department said new jobless claims were depressed by the shortened Christmas workweek even as the total number of people collecting benefits reached a 26-year high. There were 492,000 new claims for the week ended Dec. 27, below the 575,000 average estimate of economists in a Bloomberg survey.

The Treasury will auction $32 billion of three-month bills and $22 billion of six-month bills on Monday. They yielded 0.11 percent and 0.32 percent, respectively, in when-issued trading. The Treasury will sell $16 billion of 10-year bonds on Thursday. They yielded 2.37 percent.

Crude oil prices were lower and gold prices rose as trading resumed after the New Year holiday.

Crude oil prices fell in New York, extending their worst yearly drop, on concern that a global economic contraction would limit fuel demand.

Crude oil for February delivery dropped as much as $2.06, or 4.6 percent, to $42.54 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Gold rose in Asia after an eighth straight annual gain as demand increased for the metal as a hedge against inflation and an alternative asset.

Gold advanced 5.8 percent in 2008 on demand for a store of value, as a financial crisis pushed major economies into recession and drove equity markets lower.

Bullion for immediate delivery gained $2.10 an ounce to $881.55 at 9 a.m. in Singapore, after earlier rising as much as 1 percent to $888.35. Gold for February delivery fell 0.2 percent to $882.40 in after-hours electronic trading on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Among other precious metals for immediate delivery, silver fell 0.4 percent to $11.345 an ounce, platinum was little changed at $935 an ounce, and palladium rose 1.1 percent to $189 an ounce as of 8:54 a.m. in Singapore.

Oil fell 54 percent in 2008, the first annual decline since 2001 and the biggest drop since futures trading started in 1983. The February contract rose $5.57 to $44.60 a barrel on Dec. 31, the highest settlement since Dec. 12.

Fuel consumption in the United States was down 3.7 percent during the four weeks ended Dec. 26 from a year earlier, according to the Department of Energy. Oil rose 14 percent on Dec. 31 after a report showed American fuel stockpiles climbed less than expected and the conflict between Israel and Hamas raised concern that Middle East supplies may be disrupted.

“That rally on the 31st didn’t have too much behind it so we’re seeing crude come back to a level more reflective of the fundamentals,” said Toby Hassall, an analyst with Commodity Warrants Australia in Sydney. “We still don’t have a clear picture of when a global recovery is going to take place.”

Crude oil may rise next week as the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries makes record production cuts to counter the deepest economic slump since World War II.

Iran's 2009-10 budget is expected to be based on an oil price of $37.5 per barrel, a "logical" level in view of last year's price fall, Oil Minister Gholamhossein Nozari was quoted as saying on Sunday.

An Iranian newspaper last month said the government and a parliament committee had an initial agreement to base the budget starting in March on an oil price of $45, lower than previously suggested.

"The price of oil in next year's budget has been envisaged at $37.5 (per barrel) which seems to be a logical price considering the drop in prices," Nozari was quoted as saying by the semi-official Mehr News Agency.

The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) website carried a similar report, saying the government and parliament had agreed on this price for the budget, which has yet to be presented to the legislature.

Oil prices have plunged by some $100 per barrel since mid-July to around $46, pulled down by a slowing world economy.

Some 80 percent of the foreign exchange earnings of Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil producer, come from crude sales.

Economists say Iran's government, which has enjoyed windfall oil earnings in recent years, would likely have to cut spending in 2009 when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is expected to run for re-election, unless crude prices rebound to $80 or so.

The head of parliament's economic commission Gholam-Reza Mesbahi said the lower oil price was expected to cause a 33 percent drop in government revenue in the next budget, the Jahan-e Eghtesad business daily reported.

"In view of the drop in income from crude oil exports one of the necessities of the budget would be for it to be contractionary," Mesbahi was quoted as saying.

He said raising taxes would not be possible and that borrowing from the Iranian banking system would fuel inflation. Financial sanctions imposed on Iran over its disputed nuclear plans hindered borrowing from foreign banks, he said.

A government official said in October Iran was planning for an oil price of $55 to $60 in the next budget, but oil prices have continued to slide since then.

The oil price set for Iran's budget indicates government expectations but does not give a full picture.

Economists said last year's budget was officially based on a price of about $40 a barrel but, when withdrawals from an oil revenue reserve fund and other crude-related earnings were taken into account, the state needed $70 or more to balance its books.

The government has been seeking to reduce subsidies, a heavy drain on state coffers, including discussing utility bill hikes.

Ukraine sought support Friday in European capitals a day after Russia cut off gas supplies and hardened its stance on prices.

Russia's Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that it, too, was ready to explain its position in the dispute to Europe, asking for a special session of the European Commission to address the question.

But there were no face-to-face talks between Ukraine and Russia as of late afternoon Friday, a day after Russia's state-controlled energy giant Gazprom cut off gas to Ukraine, saying it had failed to pay an outstanding $2.1 billion bill.

For the moment, the two countries instead fought a public relations war.

A Ukrainian delegation headed by Energy Minister Yuriy Prodan, and including the deputy chief of gas company Naftogaz, Volodymyr Chuprun, visited Prague, the Czech Republic, and Bratislava, Slovakia, on its way to Brussels for meetings with officials.

"Our aim is to explain our position to our European partners on the situation which arose in the gas sphere," Bohdan Sokolovsky, energy adviser to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Bratislava. "We are informing them on how the negotiations are going, we are stating our negotiating position."

Sokolovsky said Ukraine was trying to reassure its neighbors that it would not interrupt gas supplies.

"We told them that Ukraine is fulfilling all of its transit obligations and they have no doubts about that," he said.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said Friday Russia was ready to go to Brussels as well to make its case to the European Union.

Many in the West viewed a 2006 Russian cutoff of gas to Ukraine as an effort to punish Ukraine's political leaders for their pro-Western policies.

That cutoff, which temporarily affected supplies to Europe, also led to accusations that Russia was an unreliable source of energy and led to calls for greater energy independence from Moscow.

This year, Russia has taken pains to paint the conflict as a purely commercial matter, and both countries have pledged they would keep gas flowing through Ukraine's pipeline system to the rest of Europe. As of late Friday afternoon there were no reports of interruptions in shipments beyond Ukraine.

Despite the apparent absence of talks, there seemed to be little sense of urgency. Experts say both Ukraine and Europe have significant stockpiles of gas.

Germany's E.ON Ruhrgas utility said it had seen no disruption to Russian gas deliveries as of Friday — although it said any effects would not be noticeable until the beginning next week because of the distance the gas travels.

In any case, "we have nearly 25 percent of our annual needs ... in reserves, so that even if gas volumes from Russia were to be reduced, we are well prepared," German Economy Ministry spokeswoman Beatrix Brodkorb said in Berlin.

Thomas Steg, a spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel, called on both sides to "negotiate quickly and constructively" on a new contract.

The cutoff came after Ukraine made a $1.5 billion overdue payment, but Russia demands another $600 million, including $450 million penalties for the late payment for gas shipped in November and December. The two sides also have not agreed on prices for 2009.

Gazprom also wants to charge Ukraine higher gas prices for 2009. Ukraine, meanwhile, says Russia should pay more to ship through its pipelines, which carry 80 percent of the gas Russia sells to European Union customers.

The dispute also reflects strained relations between the two former Soviet nations that developed after Ukraine's 2004 Orange Revolution, which brought a pro-Western government to power.

Ukraine has since sought to join NATO and supported Georgia during its brief war with Russia in August — moves that angered the Kremlin.

The recent decline in energy prices has hit Russia hard, and Gazprom faces a sharp drop in demand for energy.

Experts say efforts to resolve the dispute are also hampered by divisions within Ukraine's leadership. President Yushchenko and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko are bitter political rivals.

At one point Gazprom said it would accept $250 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas, close to the $235 that Ukraine has offered.

But late Thursday Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller toughened his company's stance, resuming an early demand of $418 per thousand cubic meters, the price Russia will charge European customers over the next few months.

Those prices are expected to slide considerably later this year, as the gas market begins to reflect the fall in world oil prices. Last year, Ukraine paid $179.50 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas.

Russian natural gas was reaching Europe in full measure Friday, one day after Russia cut supplies to Ukraine in a contract dispute, the European Union said.

French Foreign Ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier said Friday Russia and Ukraine were honoring their promise to maintain natural gas supplies to their European customers, reported RIA Novosti, the Russian news agency.

Russia cut its natural gas supplies to Ukraine Thursday after talks on a 2009 contract broke down, but increased shipments to European countries.

The European Union urged both sides to continue discussions, RIA Novosti said.

"All existing commitments to supply and transit (natural gas) must be honored," the European Union, the Czech Republic and the European Commission said in a joint statement.

Recurring disputes between Moscow and Kiev have raised concerns among European countries about Russia's reliability as a supplier, the Russian news agency said. Ukraine transports about 80 percent of Russian gas, shipped to EU members.

Tehran has agreed on a six-month pricing mechanism for natural gas imports from Turkmenistan to supply customers in northeastern Iran, officials said.

Iran holds some of the most abundant gas reserves in the world, but struggles under economic sanctions to keep up with a faltering infrastructure. Gas imports from Turkmenistan were disrupted during the 2008 winter when Ashgabat insisted on a higher price.

Resa Kasaizadeh, the head of the National Iranian Gas Export Co., said his country reached a deal on a fixed, six-month term for gas imports, the Gulf Daily News said Friday.

"It was agreed that Turkmenistan's gas would be imported to the country with a fixed price in the first six months of the year," he said.

Iran has lobbied to position itself as a regional energy hub from Central Asia to Europe amid pressure from Washington. The deal comes as Europe eyes a gas row between Ukraine and Russia.

Following the decision by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to cut production by an additional 2.2 million barrels per day, Nigeria will produce about 1.584 million barrels of crude oil per day by January 1, 2009, far below the 2.29 million barrels per day production estimated in the 2009 budget.

Lagos-base Business Day reported on Thursday that in November, following a 113,000 barrels -per day cut, Nigeria produced 1.903 million barrels per day, according to a figure given in the organization's Oil Market Report for December.

With another 319,000 barrels per day OPEC cut for Nigeria which takes effect January 1, the nation's crude oil export will dip to 1.584 million barrels per day.

Meanwhile, oil rose just a bit over 40 U.S. dollars on Monday, reinforcing the fact that the Nigerian economy will face turbulent times in 2009.

With the OPEC production cuts and falling prices, many of federal government's projections in the 2009 budget might not be met except prices rise again.

Nigeria has also based its 2009 budget on 45 U.S. dollars per barrel for its oil revenues as the international oil price has crashed to slightly more than 40 U.S. dollars per barrel this week.

According to local media reports, oil money accounts for more than 95 percent of Nigeria's export gains and over 80 percent of the federal government revenues, contributing to approximately 30 percent of the Africa's most populated country's total GDP.

Gold declined in Asia as crude oil’s rally stalled and the dollar strengthened, reducing demand for the precious metal as a hedge against inflation and an alternative asset. Platinum was little changed.

Oil fell as much as 5.2 percent, after gaining 14 percent Dec. 31, on concern that a global economic contraction will limit fuel demand. The dollar was at $1.3870 a euro from $1.4045 late yesterday in New York.

“The relationship between gold and oil has steadily strengthened as the commodity boom has progressed,” Standard Chartered Plc’s analysts Helen Henton and Dan Smith wrote in a report. “While both were affected by deleveraging and risk aversion, the oil market is far more exposed to the deterioration in global growth. As the markets have become more settled, the relationship has strengthened again.”

Bullion for immediate delivery traded down 0.5 percent to $874.90 an ounce at 12:09 p.m. in Singapore, after rising as much as 1 percent earlier. Gold for February delivery was 0.8 percent lower at $875.40 in after-hours electronic trading on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Crude oil for February delivery dropped as much as $2.32 to $42.28 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It fell 4.3 percent to $42.70 a barrel at 12:41 p.m. Singapore time.

Silver Falls

Among other precious metals for immediate delivery, silver fell 1.8 percent to $11.185 an ounce, platinum was little changed at $935.50 an ounce, and palladium rose 1.2 percent to $189.25 an ounce as of 11:50 a.m. in Singapore.

Gold advanced 5.8 percent last year on demand for a store of value as the global financial crisis pushed major economies into recession and drove equity markets down.

“If one bought gold on January 1, 2008, instead of any other investment, they would still have everything they had come January 1, 2009,” Peter Grandich, managing member of Grandich Publications, said in a report. “How many people wish all they did was break even in 2008? Gold continues to offer not only that result, but gains of 20 percent or more in 2009.”

Crude oil rose in New York for a second day as the conflict in Gaza raised concern that Middle East supplies would be cut and Russia curbed natural-gas shipments to Ukraine.

Israeli warplanes conducted fresh attacks against Hamas on the seventh day of a bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip, raising the prospect of violence in the Middle East, source of one-third of the world’s oil. Russia’s dispute with Ukraine over natural- gas prices deepened today and no new talks are scheduled. Oil futures have traded in a range of more than $5 a barrel today.

“A lot of the volatility we are seeing is a result of the wild geopolitical news,” said Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy & Economic Research, in Winchester, Massachusetts. “The news from Gaza and Ukraine scares some people and not others.”

Crude oil for February delivery rose $1.58, or 3.5 percent, to $46.18 a barrel at 11:43 a.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil dropped 54 percent last year, the first annual decline since 2001 when crude slipped 26 percent, and the biggest loss since trading began in 1983.

OAO Gazprom boosted gas supplies to Europe through Belarus, avoiding Ukrainian pipelines. Talks between the two sides on the price of gas deliveries to Ukraine for 2009 and transit fees for Russian gas to Europe through the country broke down on Dec. 31, and Gazprom cut supplies of the fuel to Ukraine yesterday.

Stocks Rally

Agricultural futures also rose and equities rallied on speculation that government stimulus efforts will curtail the recession. The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 49.78 points, 0.6 percent, to 8,826.17. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 0.4 percent to 906.87.

“Equities and commodities are tracking each other,” said Bill O’Grady, chief markets strategist at Confluence Investment Management in St. Louis. “The outsized moves we are seeing are in part due to very thin trading volume.”

Oil prices may be more volatile this week because many traders are taking time off for the New Year’s holiday.

Brent crude oil for February settlement climbed $1.16, or 2.5 percent, to $46.75 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures Europe exchange.

Crude oil fell in New York as some traders viewed a rally of 14 percent at the end of last year as excessive amid slumping demand.

Manufacturing in the U.S., the biggest energy user, probably contracted in December at the fastest pace in almost 30 years, economists said before a report today. Fuel consumption there fell an annual 3.7 percent last month, according to the Department of Energy. Oil jumped 14 percent on Dec. 31 as U.S. fuel stockpiles rose less than expected, and as the conflict between Israel and Hamas raised concern that Middle East supplies would be disrupted.

“There was an over-reach to the upside,” said Olivier Jakob, managing director of Petromatrix Gmbh in Zug, Switzerland. “The extent of the move was more due to low liquidity, and it being the end of the year” than fundamentals.

Crude oil for February delivery fell as much as $3.55, or 8 percent, to $41.05 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was at $42.28 a barrel at 1:11 p.m. London time and is up 12 percent this week.

Oil fell 54 percent in 2008, the first annual decline since 2001 and the biggest drop since futures trading started in 1983. The February contract rose $5.57 to $44.60 a barrel on Dec. 31, the highest since Dec. 12.

Fundamentals

“That rally on the 31st didn’t have too much behind it so we’re seeing crude come back to a level more reflective of the fundamentals,” said Toby Hassall, an analyst at Commodity Warrants Australia in Sydney. “We still don’t have a clear picture of when a global recovery is going to take place.”

An 8 percent drop in crude imports last year by South Korea reaffirmed the spread of plunging demand in Asia, the center for oil demand growth. The continent’s fourth-biggest economy imported 865.3 million barrels in 2008, down from 872.5 million the previous year, according to a government report today.

The U.S. Institute for Supply Management will probably say today its factory index fell to 35.4, the lowest level since 1980, from 36.2 the prior month, according to the median estimate of 57 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. A reading of less than 50 signals contraction.

U.S. stocks last year plunged the most since the Great Depression as financial shares collapsed, energy and metal producers tumbled and the economy entered a recession.

Output Cuts

The Standard & Poor’s GSCI Index of 24 commodity futures lost 47 percent last year, the most since its introduction in 1971. The Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index of 19 raw materials dropped 40 percent, the biggest plunge since 1957.

Crude oil may rise next week as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries makes record production cuts to counter the deepest economic slump since World War II.

Seven of 14 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News, or 50 percent, said futures will gain through Jan. 9. Five respondents, or 36 percent, forecast oil will fall and two said there will be little change in prices. Last week, 46 percent of analysts said prices would drop.

Oil jumped earlier this week on turmoil in the Middle East and a natural gas dispute in Europe.

Israel yesterday killed a Hamas leader in its assault on the Gaza Strip and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said her nation would keep pressure on the militant Islamic group. An army spokesman, speaking anonymously in accordance with regulations, said warplanes hit Hamas leader Nizar Rayyan’s house in the Jabaliya refugee camp.

Gas Dispute

In Europe, the repeat of an energy standoff between Russia and Ukraine threatened fuel shipments. Russia prepared to resume talks with Ukraine in their dispute over the price of natural gas after cutting supplies to its western neighbor for the second time in three years.

The European Union urged Russia and Ukraine to “rapidly” resolve their dispute and said it counted on assurances gas supplies would continue uninterrupted.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said in a statement the two sides are near a compromise, urging state utility NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy and OAO Gazprom, Russia’s gas exporter, to meet again in one or two days. Gazprom also proposed talks.

Brent crude oil for February settlement fell as much as $3.99, or 8.8 percent, to $41.60 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures Europe exchange. It was at $42.05 a barrel at 12:53 p.m. London time. The contract on Dec. 31 rose $5.44, or 14 percent, to settle at $45.59 a barrel.

Iraq announced on Wednesday that it would begin a second round of bids to license international oil companies to develop 11 oil and gas fields or groups of fields.

Iraq's oil minister, Hussain al-Shahristani, said at a news conference that he hoped that these fields could be producing 2 to 2.5 million barrels of oil a day in three or four years. The goal, he said, is to produce 6 million barrels a day in four or five years, up from the current 2.4 million.

The oil and gas fields are distributed around the country and include some that lie near the border or are shared with neighboring countries like Iran and Kuwait.

The first round of bids, announced last summer, is scheduled to be concluded in the middle of 2009. It will be for the development of six major oil fields and two gas fields.

The same 35 foreign companies that qualified to take part in the first round are involved in this one, said Ahmed al-Shammar, a deputy minister, but it is possible that more companies could be added.

Shahristani said he hoped the contracts in the second round would be signed by the end of 2009. He also said the ministry was planning to announce more licensing auctions in the future.

The ministry has come under criticism for the slow pace of Iraq's oil production. Although the country sits on one of the largest proven oil reserves in the world, roughly 115 billion barrels, security and infrastructure problems have left them largely untapped.

Iraq is producing far below its capacity, Shahristani acknowledged at the news conference, but he said opening these fields for development was meant to address that.

"There are about 78 oil and gas fields in Iraq, but only 15 of them are under operation," he said.

Plunging oil prices around the world have hurt Iraq's revenues as well; Iraq's oil is being sold for around $38 a barrel, a ministry official said, down nearly 70 percent from its high for 2008.

One of the other main events of Wednesday was to be the start of the trial of Muntader al-Zaidi, the Iraqi reporter who was arrested for throwing his shoes at President George W. Bush during a news conference two and a half weeks ago.

But Abdulsattar al-Berikdar, a spokesman for the Supreme Judicial Council, said the trial had been postponed because Zaidi's lawyer had filed an appeal.

In a phone interview, Dheyaa Saadi, the lawyer, said the appeal's purpose was to reduce the charge against Zaidi so that the case could be taken outside the jurisdiction of the Central Criminal Court of Iraq, which specializes in terrorism and other serious cases. A higher court will rule on the appeal.

Though recent statistics report that there were fewer civilian deaths in Iraq in 2008 than in any other year since the 2003 invasion, violence continues to buffet the volatile provinces of Nineveh and Diyala.

Two bombs exploded Wednesday in Mosul, the capital of Nineveh, killing 4 and wounding 20, a local security official said. The target of the first was a police patrol, and the second exploded shortly afterward, as bystanders gathered.

A candidate for the coming provincial elections was killed by unidentified gunmen on a major street in Mosul, a police official said. One policeman died in a gunfight with the attackers as they escaped.

The candidate, Mowaffaq al-Hamdani, was a Sunni Arab. The elections in Nineveh are seen as crucial for the Sunnis. Many of them boycotted the last election, leaving a provincial council dominated by a Kurdish bloc.

A car bomb exploded near a public market in Sinjar, a town in Nineveh near the Syrian border, killing 3 and wounding 35. The Kurds maintain a tight control of Sinjar, which they view as belonging to Kurdistan, a situation that has raised tensions with Sunni Arabs who live in the volatile, poverty-stricken towns to the south.

In Diyala, a bomb, its target an army patrol, exploded near Khanaqin, another area that has been involved in a tense standoff between Kurds and Arabs. Two were killed in the attack, including an officer, and two others were wounded, a security official said.

Exxon Mobile Corp. said it was ready to drill at Alaska's Point Thomson oil field contrary to the state's assertion the company would rather procrastinate.

The state has accused Exxon of holding back on drilling while it pursues other ventures and has tried to regain control the 106,000-acre field, the Anchorage Daily News reported Thursday.

Exxon is the dominant leaseholder of the oil field, the newspaper said.

The argument went to court Wednesday. Mark Ashburn, representing the state, told Judge Patrick McKay that a suit on the issue was moot, as the state had not yet given Exxon its final decision on a permit to start drilling.

Exxon said it was "ready, willing and able," to initiate its drilling in the field that could produce 10,000 barrels daily of condensate -- a light oil -- by 2014, the newspaper reported.

Ashburn called Exxon's assertion that it will drill soon "a public relations ploy."

The state contends the company is using the field as a natural warehouse and does not intend to begin drilling soon.

A decision on whether or not Exxon can continue with the suit could come within a week, Ashburn said.