(Adds government comment, details) By Catherine Bremer MEXICO CITY, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Mexico said on Wednesday its crude oil installations were safe, after a Saudi wing of al Qaeda called for attacks on U.S. oil sources around the world. Mexico, which ships about 1.4 million barrels per day of crude to the United States, tightened security around its Gulf of Mexico oil rigs in 2005 in line with international norms, a spokeswoman at state-run oil monopoly Pemex said. Mexico deployed ships, jets and helicopters to patrol its offshore oil platforms after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. It added two armed warships to the patrols in late 2004. Mexico's government said in a statement on Wednesday it remained alert but had no reason to believe that its oil installations were under threat from al Qaeda. The Mexican navy, which guards Pemex's offshore platforms, said there was no immediate plan to step up security in reaction to the al Qaeda threat on oil interests in top U.S. supplier countries Canada, Venezuela and Mexico. "We have permanent surveillance in the area," a navy spokesman said. President Felipe Calderon's office said it was evaluating the threat. Mexico already has naval officers stationed on its offshore oil platforms -- the source of some 80 percent of its crude oil output -- and an exclusion zone for ships is in place around them. Security was normal at Pemex's main Mexico City gasoline depot on the outskirts of the capital, with just regular police on guard, a Reuters photographer said. 'SOFT POINT' There has never been any evidence made public of al Qaeda activity in Mexico, which opposed the U.S.-led war in Iraq and has a very small Muslim community. The Mexican border is seen as a soft point in the U.S. war on terror. Hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants cross it annually but reports in recent years about Arab terrorists attempting to enter the United States from Mexico have turned out to be false. Mexican immigration authorities took no special action after the al Qaeda threat. "I am responsible for looking after entries into the country at all times. For the moment I don't have any special instructions," said Cecilia Romero, head of Mexico's National Institute of Migration. U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff will visit Mexico on Thursday and Friday for talks with Mexican officials. The latest threat appeared in the al Qaeda Organisation in the Arabian Peninsula's e-magazine, Sawt al-Jihad (Voice of Holy War), which was posted on a Web site used by Islamist militants. "It is necessary to hit oil interests in all regions which serve the United States, not just in the Middle East. The goal is to cut its supplies or reduce them through any means," it said, also vowing new attacks in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi al Qaeda wing was behind a failed February 2006 attack on the world's largest oil processing plant, the Abqaiq facility in Saudi Arabia. Its latest message cited production wells, export pipelines, oil terminals and tankers as possible targets. (Additional reporting by Greg Brosnan and Daniel Aguilar)
