KHARG ISLAND

Persian Jazireh-ye Khark, Arabic Jazirat Kharg, small Iranian island in the northern Persian Gulf, 34 miles (55 km) northwest of the port of Bushire (Bushehr). In the 15th century the Dutch established a factory (trading station) on the island, but in 1766 Kharg was taken by pirates based at Bandar-e Rig, a small Persian port north of Bushire. The island was virtually uninhabited for long periods thereafter, but, with Iran's 20th-century mineral prosperity, it became a crude-oil terminal and loading facility in the 1960s. Later, supertankers docked there rather than at Abadan for bulk landing. Sulfate fertilizers, liquid gas, and other petroleum products are shipped from the island. The oil terminal was damaged temporarily in the 1980s during fighting between Iraq and Iran.