Oil prices hit 11-month highs above $75 a barrel this morning to put the market within reach of the all-time record of $78.65 set in August 2006.
Abductions in Nigeria's oil producing Niger Delta and increased demand from refiners in top consumer the United States helped drive the price uptrend.
London Brent crude rose 25 cents to $75.00 a barrel by 9.52am, after touching a session high of $75.10, its highest since August 14th, 2006.
US crude rose 12 cents to $71.93.
The end of a one-month truce by the rebel group responsible for much of the violence directed at the Nigerian oil industry, an attack on an oil rig and the kidnapping of a three-year-old British girl in Port Harcourt reminded investors of the continued risk to supplies from the world's eighth-largest oil exporter.
Some 700,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Nigerian production is shut in after a year and a half of attacks on its oil industry.
Concerns over whether US gasoline inventories could keep pace with robust demand lingered despite a higher-than-expected weekly stock rise of 1.8 million barrels reported by the US Energy Information Administration.
Stocks are below normal levels for this time of the year while gasoline demand is up 1.2 per cent from last year.
This year's lengthy string of refinery upsets persisted as well, with BP shutting a hydrocracking unit at its 260,000 bpd Los Angeles-area refinery for unplanned repairs that might last up to 10 day, sources said.