Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Gaza e Iraq, occupazione e Petrolio

Gaza:
As Israel chronically under-supplies power to the Gaza Strip (see
article by Amira Hass posted earlier on JPN), it is also blocking
development of another major energy source. A rich untapped off-shore
gas field could, according to Tim Butcher of the Telegraph, ensure
Gaza a sustainable, independent economy. Reporting on what he views as
Israeli stall tactics in dealing with British Gas, Butcher depicts the
multinational as a neutral agent poised to develop the gas fields to
the benefit Gazans. His account obscures a world-wide history of
similar development projects as, first and foremost, benefiting
multinational corporations, not the local population. The people of
Gaza may stand to lose their title to this natural resource even if
Israel does allow its development.
However, as it seems to me, Israel's actual stand on a deal regarding
Gaza's gas field remains stubbornly obscure. Last month, the Hebrew
financial daily, The Marker, reported accusations by former Chief of
Staff, Moshe Yaalon, that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had refrained
from re-invading Gaza to avoid jeopardizing a deal with British Gas
(October 21). Journalist Avi Bar-Eli said that Yaalon, now a member of
a right-wing, neoliberal think tank ("The Shalem Center"; see Nissim
Kalderon, July 11, 2007, Hebrew, 
http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/spages/879932.html
),
had accused Olmert of disregarding the direct support for terrorism
that a Gaza gas works would provide and ignoring that such a plant
could offer Iran [sic] an excellent target for attack. While Yaalon
made use of standard scare-clichés to challenge Olmert, the challenge
itself coming from a well connected ex-Chief of Staff, might hint that
financial motives, no less than so-called 'national security' ones,
are behind Israel'
s
moves on the issue. If so, this too, like the history of development
and globalization, could well mean that Gaza's population~Wnow living
under imposed and severe deprivation~Wstands to gain very little or
nothing from a contract with British Gas.
Rela Mazali
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/11/07/do0705.xml
Gaza doesn't need aid: it has a £2bn gas field
By Tim Butcher
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 07/11/2007
Worldstage
International donors will - again - gather next month to pledge money
for the Palestinians.
This time France hosts the Palestinian panhandling circus, but the
same chorus that for years has argued aid will help solve Palestinian
grievances will be heard once more.
Tony Blair, in his job as international envoy to the Palestinians,
will look earnest and speak publicly about the importance of the world
providing financial support.
But instead of checking into their smart Parisian hotels, donors would
do better to come to Gaza to help free a Palestinian economic asset so
large that it would do away with the need to bleed the international
community of millions in aid every year.
Twenty miles from the beaches of Gaza, too far for the eye to see but
still very much in Palestinian waters, lies a fortune in untapped, off-
shore gas. Prospecting vessels sent down two probes seven years ago
and what they found got the juices of executives from multinational
fuel companies flowing. In one field alone, experts estimated a
reserve of £2 billion worth of natural gas. And there is plenty of
potential for other fields.
A similar discovery in the Persian Gulf would have been exploited
promptly and, within a few years, millions of pounds in taxes would
have begun pouring into the local government's coffers. But Gaza is
not on the Gulf and the development of the Gaza Marine field remains
trapped in the web of mutual hostility between the Palestinians and
Israelis.
So complete is Israel's control of the vestigial Palestinian state
that, for years, the Jewish state was able to block development of the
field. Back then, the plan was for the Gaza gas to be sold to Egypt,
but this was during the second intifada, when the prime minister,
Ariel Sharon, said there was no way he would allow a project to grow
that would earn money for Yasser Arafat.
Things have moved on some: Arafat is dead, Sharon remains in a stroke-
induced coma and a ceasefire of sorts ended the intifada. Ironically,
the pointy-heads in the Israeli government, the ones responsible for
plotting the future, also changed their tune.
Instead of Egypt buying Gaza's gas in the future, it suddenly began to
make sense for Israel to become the purchaser: Israel's indigenous gas
fields - north of the Gaza Marine field - could run out within a few
years and the only other long-term source will be a pipeline from
neighbouring Egypt.
At first sight, this appears a win-win situation. The Palestinians
would have a guaranteed purchaser for their gas, one that would
generate £50 million a year for 15 years in tax revenues, and provide
the foundation for sustainable economic growth. And the Israelis would
have a secure source of affordable gas to underwrite their economy's
growth. It would also neatly show how two historic enemies could come
to rely on each other for economic prosperity.
A negotiating team, led by Nigel Shaw from British Gas, the company
that bought the rights to develop Gaza Marine, duly moved into an
office block in a smart Israeli coastal town and prepared to draw up
the various legal documents and guarantees that are standard in the
international gas and oil industry.
But in spite of public statements from Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime
minister, that he supports the project, and even the intervention of
Gordon Brown, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, who identified the
deal as key to the development of the Palestinian economy,
negotiations have not budged.
Approaches made by The Daily Telegraph to key Israeli government
stakeholders - the National Infrastructure ministry and Prime
Minister's Office - have resulted in similar statements about
"negotiations progressing" and "final agreements being imminent", but
industry insiders have revealed that, in reality, no agreement is in
sight.
There were some Israeli concerns that the gas money might end up in
the hands of Hamas, but they were dealt with last year, when a trust
fund was set up that ensured international cash goes only to the
Palestinian government appointed by Mahmoud Abbas, president of the
Palestinian national authority and leader of Fatah.
If Mr Blair is serious about his mission to help develop a sustainable
Palestinian economy, he could put his weight behind getting the Gaza
gas project off the ground. So far, he has set his sights a bit lower,
talking publicly only about redeveloping a sewage plant in Gaza and
cautiously dodging attempts to involve him with Gaza Marine.
Unless he shows a bit more courage, one fears next month's donor
conference for the Palestinians will not be the last.
Iraq:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/04/world/middleeast/04oil.html?_r=1&pagewanted=p&oref=slogin
Iraq, With U.S. Support, Voids a Russian Oil Contract
By ANDREW E. KRAMER
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 - Guided by American legal advisers, the Iraqi
government has canceled a controversial development contract with the
Russian company Lukoil for a vast oil field in Iraq's southern desert,
freeing it up for potential international investment in the future.
In response, Russian authorities have threatened to revoke a 2004 deal
under the Paris Club of creditor nations to forgive $13 billion in
Iraqi debt, a senior Iraqi official said.
The field, West Qurna, has estimated reserves of 11 billion barrels,
the equivalent of the worldwide proven oil reserves of Exxon Mobil,
America's largest oil company. Hussain al-Shahristani, the Iraqi oil
minister, said in an interview that the field would be opened to new
bidders, perhaps as early as next year.
The contract, which had been signed and later canceled by the Saddam
Hussein government, had been in legal limbo since the American
invasion. But the Kremlin remained hopeful it could be salvaged until
this September, when Mr. Shahristani traveled to Moscow to inform
officials there that the decision to cancel it was final, he said.
The Russian government, newly emboldened in international affairs by
its expanding oil wealth, is still backing Lukoil's claim and
protesting what it considers selective enforcement of contracts in
Iraq.
"We will defend our interests," Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin
spokesman, said in a telephone interview. "It is the government's
obligation to defend the interests of our companies in foreign
countries."
One Iraqi official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was
discussing a confidential diplomatic exchange, described Russia's
response as, "If you do the deal, we can muster the political muscle
to forgive the debt."
West Qurna, mapped by Soviet geologists in the 1980s but mostly
untapped, is one of a dozen or so supergiant oil fields in the world.
They are known in the industry as "elephants," fields so large they
can tip the fortunes of companies or countries.
The field will produce one million barrels of oil a day after four to
five years of development, according to both Iraqi oil officials and
Lukoil; that is the approximate equivalent of the current output of
the North Slope in Alaska.
In Lukoil's 1997 production-sharing agreement, Saddam Hussein's
government awarded the company development rights to the 11 billion
barrels of oil for a paltry signing bonus of $10 million. The deal,
concluded when Iraq was seeking Russian support in a failed effort to
lift United Nations sanctions, allotted 9.6 percent of the output to
Lukoil.
The contract presented a quandary for the United States, which has
been accused by some critics of invading Iraq for its oil. There is
little evidence to date that the war effort has given American oil
companies an inside track to Iraq's reserves, and the Lukoil deal is
the only one involving a major oil company to be reversed since the
start of the war.
But as a cornerstone of its foreign policy, the United States has
argued vigorously for countries to honor petroleum contracts. In that
light, condoning the cancellation of the Lukoil contract could be seen
in some quarters as evidence of a double standard.
"From the Russian government perspective, Iraq is seen as occupied and
its administration directed by Washington, particularly when it comes
to oil," Vladimir I. Tikhomirov, chief economist at the Russian bank
UralSib, said in a telephone interview.
"The Russians see the cancellation of their contract in Iraq as part
of the U.S. drive to keep control over the major oil fields there," he
said.
The Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, has raised the issue with
President Bush several times since the 2003 invasion. In an interview
with the BBC in June 2003, Mr. Putin said Mr. Bush had gone as far as
offering assurances.
"At our last meeting," Mr. Putin said, "Bush directly and clearly
said, 'We do not have any goals of pressuring Russian companies out of
Iraq and we are ready to create the conditions for working together
there.' I have no reason not to believe him."
The legality of the Lukoil contract remains murky. It is Iraq's stated
policy, as laid out in a draft oil law now before Parliament, to honor
contracts signed by the Saddam Hussein government. It is doing just
that with contracts with Chinese, Vietnamese, Indonesian and Indian
oil companies.
But the Iraqis note that it was the Saddam Hussein government that
canceled the Lukoil contract. The government's spokesman, Tariq Aziz,
said at the time that the government believed the Russians were
negotiating with the Americans to secure the contract in event of an
invasion.
Early in the American occupation, the question arose whether the
Hussein government's decision was valid, said Michael Stinson, the
former chief adviser to the Iraqi Oil Ministry. The answer was
supplied by the principal American legal adviser to the ministry at
the time, Robert Maguire, who Mr. Stinson said was then working for
the Defense Department. Mr. Maguire drew on pre-Hussein-era law to
justify the cancellation, Mr. Stinson said.
James Glanz contributed reporting.
Commento di FAIR:
----------------
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=22&media_view_id=9476
Seeking to explain why the U.S. government's helping Iraq kill a huge
Saddam-era oil deal with a Russian company can't be as bad as it
looks, Kramer asserts that though the U.S. "has been accused by some
critics of invading Iraq for its oil," there really
is little evidence to date that the war effort has given American oil
companies an inside track to Iraq's reserves, and the Lukoil deal is
the only one involving a major oil company to be reversed since the
start of the war. But as a cornerstone of its foreign policy, the
United States has argued vigorously for countries to honor petroleum
contracts.
Note that while "honor[ing] petroleum contracts" is a "cornerstone" of
U.S. foreign policy, the idea that the U.S. might fight a war over oil
issues is a crazy conspiracy theory. And pity those poor oil companies
who failed to get an inside track to Iraqi oil reserves; the fact that
oil is selling for about five times as much as it was at the beginning
of 2002 must be some consolation, though.
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