September 20, 2005
Asia-Pacific Petroleum Conference Underway in Singapore
"The 21st Asia-Pacific Petroleum Conference (APPEC) opened in Singapore on Monday evening [September 19, 2005] with the theme of "High oil prices: fundamentals versus financials," according to People's Daily Online.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 06:23 AM | Comments (0)
August 25, 2005
Disputing Over Oil in Southern Sudan
Paul Redfern, a special correspondent for The East African, asked in the publication's August 22-28, 2005 edition: What do a former England cricket star, a South African businessman and the new leader of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement have in common?
The answer, in a nutshell, is oil. And lots of it. For between them Salva Kiir, Phil Edmonds and Andrew Groves are the controlling influences in White Nile, a company that could in the near future exploit the vast oil reserves hidden beneath the surface in the Block Ba oil concession in southern Sudan.Mr. Redfern said, "The deal between the SPLM and White Nile, which originated in August 2004, is contested by Total, who say they were given the concession rights for Block Ba by the government in Khartoum in 1980."
The West's desire to have a steady supply of oil and profits seems to be the cause of such more trouble in the Middle East and Africa. Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 07:06 AM | Comments (0)
August 14, 2005
IRNA Says Tehran Times Calls for Oil Boycott
The Islamic Republic News Agency of Iran reported August 14, 2005 that, The Tehran Times "suggested in its editorial that the world oil-rich states should form a united front in order to confront "Western neocolonialist countries."
It won't happen because the leaders of oil producing nations, with the exception of Iran and Venezuela, don't have the balls or the interest to do launch an oil boycott.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 02:40 PM | Comments (0)
The Australian: 'Bush Must Oil Latin Cogs'
David Nason, the New York correspondent for The Australian, told his readers in an August 15, 2005 article that, "A question now being asked is what would happen" if Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez "suddenly decided to stop supplying the US with oil or, worse, if he did a Saddam Hussein and stopped oil exports altogether?
"Venezuela is the world's fifth largest supplier of oil. It provides almost 17 per cent of US oil imports and the anti-Americanism espoused by Chavez seems to be escalating," Mr. Nason wrote.
The article raises other interesting points and notes that, "the world [is] guzzling oil at the rate of 83.7 million barrels a day and [that there is] no spare capacity in the market."
He told readers "a political upheaval that disrupted the world's finely balanced oil supply could be catastrophic."
"For Bush," he concluded, "getting to know Chavez - or at least getting to understand him a little better - ought to be on his list of oil priorities, along with some kind of meaningful national policy on alternative energy."
For more, see "Bush must oil Latin cogs."
Posted by Munir Umrani at 02:30 PM | Comments (0)
August 06, 2005
Oil Exploration Expected to Continue in Mauritania
The Oil & Gas Journal says, "International oil companies working in Mauritania have expressed confidence about operations in the country despite a bloodless military coup that toppled the government of former President Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya while he was abroad on August 3, " 2005. Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 11:46 AM | Comments (0)
August 03, 2005
Oil Exploration in Southern Sudan Hinges on Peace Process
A Reuters article in the August 3, 2005 edition of the Sudan Tribune says "Sudan's fragile peace process will determine the fate of a major oil exploration deal following the death of the country's first vice president John Garang, analysts said on Tuesday," August 2, 2005.
Reuters said the British firm "White Nile still plans to drill for oil" in [the Block Ba oil deposit] in the south of Africa's largest country and says Khartoum has given assurances that it is "business as usual" after Garang was killed in a helicopter crash at the weekend."
"But doubts linger," the wire service said. Block Ba reportedly holds up to five billion barrels of oil. For more, see "Sudan peace process crucial to White Nile oil deal."
Posted by Munir Umrani at 01:05 AM | Comments (0)
July 15, 2005
Iraq's Oil And Gas Reserves
In a June 2005 country analysis on Iraq brief, the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration said, "According to the Oil and Gas Journal, Iraq contains 115 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, the third largest in the world (behind Saudi Arabia and Canada), concentrated overwhelmingly (65 percent or more) in southern Iraq. Estimates of Iraq's oil reserves and resources vary widely, however, given that only about 10 percent of the country has been explored. Some analysts (the Baker Institute, Center for Global Energy Studies, the Federation of American Scientists, etc.) believe, for instance, that deep oil-bearing formations located mainly in the vast Western Desert region could yield large additional oil resources (possibly another 100 billion barrels or more), but have not been explored. Other analysts, such as the U.S. Geological Survey, are not as optimistic, with median estimates for additional oil reserves closer to 45 billion barrels. In August 2004, Iraqi Oil Minister Ghadban stated that Iraq had "unconfirmed or potential reserves" of 214 billion barrels.
The report noted that, "In early May 2005, Ibraihim Bahr al-Uloum was named to replace Ghadban, stating that his main goals were to reduce corruption in the oil sector, to improve fuel availability, to reduce attacks on oil infrastructure (Ghadban had cited 642 such attacks in 2004 at a cost of $10 billion), and to re-establish an Iraqi National Oil Company (INOC) by the end of 2005."
The question is: Who will benefit from Iraq's oil? Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 10:28 PM | Comments (0)
June 03, 2005
'India to Host Caspian Oil Sellers and Asian Oil Buyers'
India's Petroleum Minister, Mani Shankar Aiyar, was quoted in Indian Express as saying, "In the week beginning October 17, we propose to host the oil ministers from Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan to a meeting with the four prime Asian buyers." They are: China, Korea, Japan and India.
I wonder what impact this will have on the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the price of oil on the world market. Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 07:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 23, 2005
Whappened to $69 Million in Iraqi Oil Receipts?
On May 21, 2005, Michel Picard, Managing Partner of KPMG's Iraq Desk sent a Statement of Cash Receipts and Payments for the Development Fund for Iraq" to the International Advisory and Monitoring Board for Iraq (IAMBI) and to the Government of Iraq. The audit reports were published on May 23, 2005. The bottom line was that $69 million dollars worth of oil was unaccounted for. Th audit covered the period June 29, 2004 to December 31, 2004. The following reports were also sent to IAMBI, which was created by the United Nations to keep track of Iraq's wealth while it is under occupation:
Report of Factual Findings in connection with Export Sales;
Report of Factual Findings in connection with the Oil Proceeds Receipts Account;
Report of Factual Findings in connection with Disbursements; and
Management Letter on Internal Controls.
In the 20-page "Statement of Cash Receipts and Payments," KPMG, who was hired by IAMBI, said:
We have audited the accompanying statement of cash receipts and payments of the Development Fund for Iraq (DFI or the Fund) for the period from 29 June 2004 to 31 December 2004. This financial statement is the responsibility of the Government of Iraq. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on the accompanying financial statement based on our audit.KPMG said, "The potential effect is that receipts for the period from 29 June 2004 to 31 December 2004 and cash as at 31 December 2004 would have been higher by $69,000,000, less 5% to be transferred to the Compensation Fund. It was not practicable to extend our auditing procedures sufficiently to satisfy ourselves over the completeness of export sales. Here's a link to the reports.Except as discussed in the following three paragraphs, we conducted our audit in accordance with International Standards on Auditing and International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions (INTOSAI) Standards on Government Auditing. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statement is free of material misstatement. An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statement. An audit also includes assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by the Government of Iraq, as well as evaluating the overall financial statement presentation. We believe that our audit provides a reasonable basis for our opinion.
As described in Note 4 to the financial statement, the internal control systems over the Iraqi oil industry were not sufficient to ensure the completeness of export sales of petroleum and petroleum products for the period from inception (22 May 2003) to 31 December 2004, from which proceeds were required to be deposited in the Fund in accordance with United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1483. It was not practicable to extend our auditing procedures sufficiently to quantify such amounts and accordingly we could not satisfy ourselves over the completeness of export sales.
As described in Note 4 to the financial statement, a reconciliation of fuel oil produced, consumed and exported contained 618,203 tons (approximate market value of $69,000,000) of unreconciled quantities. The implication is that fuel oil produced was greater than consumed and exported. Consistent with these unreconciled quantities, recorded export sales of fuel oil decreased by 561,596 tons when compared with the prior period. We were not provided with a satisfactory explanation for these matters.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 11:50 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 22, 2005
Alberta Sands Reportedly Hold Oil Reserves of 175 Billion Barrels
The Alberta's oil sands "just north of the oil boomtown of Fort McMurray," Alberta, Canada "are destined to be the main supply of foreign oil to the United States for at least the next century," according to a report by San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Robert Collier. He said, "the sands hold proven reserves of 175 billion barrels, second only to Saudi Arabia's 262 billion, and far more than the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge's estimated 10 billion." The environment destruction necessary to get to the oil is amazing and disheartening. Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 03:05 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Chavez Says Foreign Oil Firms Owe Venezuela 2 Billion Dollars
An Agence France Press article in Gulf Times of Qatar says "Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has turned up the pressure on foreign oil companies by adding a clause to their contracts that will allow his government to raise the royalties and taxes it levies on the crude oil extracted from Venezuela. The populist leader has already put the oil giants on notice that they owed his government a total of almost $2 billion in back royalties," the report notes. Here's more.
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Kazakhstan Ready to Join Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline
The State Telegraph Agency of Azerbaijan reported May 20, 2005 that, "Kazakhstan is ready to sign the agreement on joining the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan main export pipeline," an AzerTAj correspondent learnt from the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan." Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 02:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
'Oil to be Pumped from Baku on May 25, 2005'
The Journal of Turkish Weekly reports that, "One of Turkey's long-dreamed about energy projects is finally coming true. On May 25, the first oil will be pumped to the start point of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline that will transport Caspian oil for the world market to Mediterranean," the publication said. Here's more.
Posted by Munir Umrani at 02:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 21, 2005
The Oil-for-Food Program Investigation
On January 13, 2005, Claudio Gatti, "a New York-based investigative reporter for Il Sole 24 Ore, the Italian business daily," reported in a Financial Times of London article headline "US Ignored Warning on Iraqi Oil Smuggling that For months, the US Congress has been investigating activities that violated the United Nations oil-for-food programme and helped Saddam Hussein build secret funds to acquire arms and buy influence.
President George W. Bush has linked future US funding of the international body to a clear account of what went on under the multi-billion dollar programme. But a joint investigation by the Financial Times and Il Sole 24 Ore, the Italian business daily, shows that the single largest and boldest smuggling operation in the oil-for-food programme was conducted with the knowledge of the US government. Although the financial beneficiaries were Iraqis and Jordanians, the fact remains that the US government participated in a major conspiracy that violated sanctions and enriched Saddam's cronies, a former UN official said. That is exactly what many in the US are now accusing other countries of having done. I think it's pretty ironic.
Overall, the operation involved 14 tankers engaged by a Jordanian entity to load at least 7m barrels of oil for a total of no less than $150m (113m) of illegal profits. About another $50m went to Mr Hussein's cronies. In February 2003, when US media first published reports of this smuggling effort, then attributed exclusively to the Iraqis, the US mission to the UN condemned it as immoral.
However, FT/Il Sole have evidence that US and UK missions to the UN were informed of the smuggling while it was happening and that they reported it to their respective governments, to no avail. Oil traders were told informally that the US let the tankers go because Amman needed oil to build up its strategic reserves in expectation of the Iraq war.In May 2005 the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, headed by Senator Norman Coleman, Republican of Minnesota, is still looking into the so-called oil-for-food scandal.
On May 17, 2005 witnesses Dan M. Berkowitz, counsel to the minority, U..S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; Mark L Greenblatt, counsel to the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and; Steven A. Groves, counsel to the U.S. Senate Permanent subcommittee on Investigations testified. Here's a LexisNexis link to their testimony.
Senator Coleman seems determine to expose foreigners who may or may not have profited from the Oil-For-Food food program. On May 17, 2005, he said:
Today the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations will present evidence delineating how Saddam Hussein exploited the oil-for-food program for his own political purposes. Saddam utilized the same methodology time after time. Over the past week, the subcommittee has released a number of bipartisan reports detailing how the Hussein regime quickly manipulated the use of oil allocations to garner political influence around the globe.George Galloway, of Britain, the Member of Parliament for Bethnal Green and Bow, England, and his charity, the Mariam Fund, have been accused of benefitting from Mr. Hussein's efforts to buy influence.As one Hussein regime official described the scheme, Saddam used oil to his geopolitical and strategic advantage. The plan was simple: rather than granting allocations to traditional oil purchasers, Iraq gave priority to foreign officials, journalists and even terrorist entities. The central purpose of this tactic, according to senior officials of the Hussein regime interviewed by the subcommittee, was to engender international support for the Hussein regime and against the U.N. sanctions.
By allocating the oil to favored people or entities, the regime forced oil purchasers to obtain allocations from those favored few. Those allocation holders essentially became gatekeepers to Iraqi oil. As gatekeepers, they demanded or earned a commission, which typically ranged from three (cents) to 30 cents per barrel. In light of the fact that most allocations consisted of millions of barrels of oil, such commissions were quite lucrative, reaching hundreds of thousands of dollars per allocation.
But instead of running away from the charge he testified before the committee on May 17, 2005. He told Senator Coleman:
Senator, I am not now, nor have I ever been, an oil trader, and neither has anyone on my behalf. I have never seen a barrel of oil, owned one, bought one, sold one - and neither has anyone on my behalf.If the investigation into the program continues, official U.S. government involvement in subverting the program to aid its friends could be exposed.
"Now I know that standards have slipped in the last few years in Washington, but for a lawyer you are remarkably cavalier with any idea of justice. I am here today but last week you already found me guilty. You traduced my name around the world without ever having asked me a single question, without ever having contacted me, without ever written to me or telephoned me, without any attempt to contact me whatsoever. And you call that justice.
So far, only U.S. businessmen have been indicted for violating the program. As ABC News noted on April 14, 2005, the Justice Department and FBI "announced the indictment of Texas oil tycoon David Chalmers and a South Korean who investigators tell ABC News is the key to learning more about how former U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali and other U.N. officials may have illegally manipulated the Oil for Food Program. The South Korean, Tongsun Park, is alleged to have received Iraqi money from the only other American so far indicted in the Oil for Food program, Samir Vincent, with the intention of paying off U.N. officials to better the program," ABC said, adding: "The U.N. officials remain unnamed."
Posted by Munir Umrani at 03:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
