U.S. reliance on Iraqi oil grows despite "evil" tag

NEW YORK, Feb 27 (Reuters) - As U.S. President George W. Bush singles out Iraq as the keystone of a global ``axis of evil,'' the U.S. oil industry last year deepened its dependence on Baghdad's supplies, U.S. Energy Department figures show.
Despite Washington's hard line towards Iraq, the United States is comfortably the world's largest consumer of Iraqi crude oil and depends on Baghdad for some 9 percent of its oil imports.
Valero Energy Corp. (NYSE:VLO - news) and ChevronTexaco Corp. (NYSE:CVX - news) are the biggest U.S. buyers of Baghdad's oil and would be most in need of alternative supplies if, as some fear, military confrontation with the United States disrupts Iraqi oil flows in coming months.
U.S. firms gobbled up some 790,000 barrels per day of Iraqi crude oil in 2001 -- nearly half of Iraq's crude sales under the U.N.-supervised oil-for-food program (see table below).