JFE: Production lines halted at a plant due to power outage

TOKYO, March 14 (Reuters) - JFE Steel Corp , the world's No.5 steelmaker, said on Monday shipments from its 10 million tonnes per year Higashi Nihon plant near Tokyo have virtually halted due to a power outage.

"Production lines have stopped as we need to cooperate with the government's power cut plans," a company spokesman said.

JFE resumed operations on Sunday of two blast furnaces at its Higashi Nihon plant, one of its two mainstay plants, that were idled after Friday's quake and tsunami.

JFE has total production capacity of about 32 million tonnes, and operates a bigger plant in western Japan with a capacity of more than 20 million tonnes a year.

(Reporting by Yuko Inoue, sourced:Reuters)