Far from the Middle East war, fallout from oil disruptions is reverberating across the world, unsettling lives from Lagos to Manila as people adjust to fuel price hikes and gas shortages.

Benchmark oil prices are hovering around $100, a surge of around 40 to 50 percent since the war against Iran began to disrupt oil supplies.

Weeks before war broke out, Adeola Sanni, a 36-year-old Nigerian entrepreneur making corporate uniforms in Lagos, had planned to hire an additional worker.

By Joe Cash and Xiuhao Chen

Beijing, March 20 (Reuters) - China called for an end to the war in the Middle East on Friday, warning of the impact on global energy, shipping and trade, with the near three-week conflict showing no sign of slowing.

"History and reality have repeatedly shown the world that force is not the solution to problems and armed conflict will only breed new hatred," Lin Jian, a spokesperson for China's foreign ministry said when asked whether Beijing had a message for Muslim communities as they mark the end of the holy month of Ramadan.

US-Israeli airstrikes after almost three weeks of war have killed Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei and a whole echelon of the political and military elite in the Islamic republic.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday said Iran is "being decimated" while the Israeli army on its Persian-language X account described the Iranian leadership as a "house of cards that is collapsing".

But several key figures have survived and the Islamic republic has shown resilience in rapidly replacing killed leaders and also keeping up the war against the US and Israel.

NEAR TEL AVIV, Israel, March 20 (Reuters) - France's Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said he did not see an obvious end to the conflict in the Middle East in the short-term, but that France and its allies would continue to work towards trying to find a lasting solution.

"There is no obvious short-term way out of the ongoing regional escalation, which has in some ways been unfolding since October 7, 2023. But this must in no way serve as a pretext for inaction," Barrot told reporters after meeting with Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar in Tel Aviv.

By Emma Farge

GENEVA, March 20 (Reuters) - The outgoing head of the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency has warned that the viability of the organisation is in doubt, a letter showed on Friday, saying any collapse would result in Israel taking over its humanitarian work in Gaza.

The warning from Philippe Lazzarini comes at a decisive moment for the agency, which has suffered from major funding problems for months, with no permanent replacement yet appointed ahead of his departure on March 31.

By Uditha Jayasinghe

COLOMBO, March 20 (Reuters) - Sri Lanka declined permission for two U.S. combat aircraft to land at a civilian airport earlier this month, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake told parliament on Friday.

The U.S. had requested permission for the two aircraft to land at the Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport in the southern part of the country from March 4-8, Dissanayake told lawmakers.

"They wanted to bring two warplanes armed with eight anti-ship missiles from a base in Djibouti," he said during a statement.

March 20 (Reuters) - Switzerland on Friday said it would not issue licences for companies to export weapons to the United States due to the ongoing attacks on Iran, citing the country's neutrality.

"The export of war materiel to countries involved in the international armed conflict with Iran cannot be authorised for the duration of the conflict," the government said in a statement.

"Exports of war materiel to the USA cannot currently be authorised," it added.

AMSTERDAM, March 20 (Reuters) - The Netherlands is stepping up security for Iranian dissidents living in the country after a man of Iranian descent who is known to be critical of the authorities in Tehran was shot, Dutch Justice Minister David van Weel said on Friday.

A spokesperson for Van Weel declined to provide more details.

KYIV, March 20 (Reuters) - Ukraine has deployed interceptor units to protect critical and civil infrastructure in five Middle Eastern countries, Ukraine's security council secretary Rustem Umerov said after a visit to the region.

"Work is also underway to expand coverage areas," Umerov wrote on X.

(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa, writing by Max Hunder, Editing by William Maclean)

"We were attacked," wrote a sailor in the Strait of Hormuz, the crucial waterway blocked for weeks since US-Israeli strikes triggered a war with Iran, in a group chat seen by AFP on Friday.

The conversations in Chinese on the messaging app WeChat -- provided by a worker whose ship has been stuck in the Gulf since the conflict started -- paint a vivid picture of the perils now facing sailors there, who hail from around the world.