LONDON - OIL prices rose on Friday as Hurricane Ike forced the closure of energy production facilities in the Gulf of Mexico, traders said.

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in October, climbed 1.15 dollars to 102.02 dollars (S$146.6) a barrel.

Brent North Sea crude for October gained 98 cents to 98.60 dollars.

Hurricane Ike on Friday bore down on Houston, the fourth largest US city, sending hundreds of thousands of people fleeing amid a warning that those remaining in low-lying areas 'face certain death'.

Oil and natural gas production in the Gulf of Mexico was largely closed, though the US Department of Energy said Ike appeared likely to spare most rigs and platforms there.

'Some 95.9 per cent of the Gulf of Mexico's 1.3 million barrels per day of oil production and 73.1 per cent of its 7.4 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas production has been turned off,' the department said in a statement issued on Thursday.

The bulk of US oil refineries are in the gulf, where Anglo-Dutch oil giant Shell began evacuating personnel on Wednesday.

Crude futures were also higher after Venezuela President Hugo Chavez on Thursday threatened to halt the supply of oil to the United States, its main client, if Washington attacked his government.

The threat came after Mr Chavez announced that US ambassador to Venezuela Patrick Duddy had 72 hours to leave the country.

'If there is any aggression towards Venezuela' from Washington, 'there would be no oil for the people of the United States,' Mr Chavez said at a public event near Caracas.

Venezuela's order to expel Duddy was an act of solidarity with Bolivia, which expelled its US envoy Philip Goldberg on Wednesday after accusing him of encouraging a break-up of Bolivia through support of opposition groups.

Deadly clashes in Bolivia on Thursday stoked fears of further widespread unrest and possibly even civil war.

At least eight people were killed and a dozen wounded in violent clashes between pro- and anti-government protesters in the northeastern town of Cobija, officials said. -- AFP