Thread: Iraq/Dinar News. 09/05 to 01/14/07

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DECEMBER 11, 2006
1:20 PM

Iraq War and Oil

WASHINGTON - December 11 - The Dow Jones news service, which has obtained a proposed draft of a new oil law for Iraq, reports: "Iraq's first postwar draft hydrocarbon law recommends the government sign production sharing agreements and other service and buyback contracts ... An Iraqi oil ministry official told Dow Jones Newswires Wednesday the new law proposes allowing -- for the first time -- local and international companies to carry out oil exploration in Iraq." (Full article)

Co-chair of the Iraq Study Group, Lee Hamilton was questioned yesterday about provisions in the Group's report that call for Iraq's oil industry to be "reorganized" as a "commercial enterprise" to "encourage investment in Iraq's oil sector by ... international energy companies." He declined to clarify whether the Group was calling for some sort of privatization, though he did note that the Group's report had "as many recommendations on oil" as on any other issue.

Similar questions were asked of incoming Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Oregon). (Full transcript below; video at Washington Stakeout)


ANTONIA JUHASZ
A visiting scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies, Juhasz wrote the piece "It's Still About Oil in Iraq," published in the Dec. 8 edition of the Los Angeles Times, which states: "While the Bush administration, the media and nearly all the Democrats still refuse to explain the war in Iraq in terms of oil, the ever-pragmatic members of the Iraq Study Group share no such reticence.

"Page 1, Chapter 1 of the Iraq Study Group report lays out Iraq's importance to its region, the U.S. and the world with this reminder: 'It has the world's second-largest known oil reserves.' The group then proceeds to give very specific and radical recommendations as to what the United States should do to secure those reserves. If the proposals are followed, Iraq's national oil industry will be commercialized and opened to foreign firms.

"The report makes visible to everyone the elephant in the room: that we are fighting, killing and dying in a war for oil. It states in plain language that the U.S. government should use every tool at its disposal to ensure that American oil interests and those of its corporations are met." Juhasz is author of the book The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time.
More Information
More Information


JAMES PAUL
Executive director of the Global Policy Forum, Paul has written several pieces about oil including "Oil in Iraq: The Heart of the Crisis." He said today: "The cat is finally slipping out of the bag. U.S. policy in Iraq has been fixated on the oil prize for a very long time and the Baker-Hamilton report gives us an important glimpse of that. The language about re-organizing Iraq's oil industry as a 'commercial enterprise' is shorthand for Exxon and BP returning to their former (pre-1972) control over Iraq's oil so that they can rake in future profits in the trillions of dollars. Iraq may be an unspeakable tragedy, but the oil giants are still hoping for 'victory' if they can push the oil law through the Iraqi parliament and ink the contracts before the occupation collapses into oblivion."
More Information


GREG MUTTITT
Muttitt is lead researcher at the British group Platform. He is the primary author of the report "Crude Designs: The Rip-Off of Iraq's Oil Wealth," which outlines the structure of production sharing agreements [PSAs]. He said today: "We know from the Dow Jones report that there are plans for Iraq's oil to be developed by PSAs -- which can be described as Privatization by Stealth Agreements. They give rights to Iraq's oil to multinational companies for decades into the future at the expense of the Iraqi people.

"The Baker-Hamilton report says very clearly that an oil law is needed for foreign investment -- this is shorthand for PSAs. Elsewhere the report says that Bush should emphasize that the U.S. is not interested in oil in Iraq. These are two recommendation of the report that Bush will follow.

"The Bush administration had been calling for a new oil law. It had been claiming that such a law was necessary because foreign investment is needed. More recently, the administration has been claiming such a law would help solve sectarian problems. But this is a Trojan Horse. If one's actual goal were solving sectarian conflict, PSAs would hardly be the remedy. Their real reason is to ensure that multinational oil companies take a share of Iraq's oil."
More Information


***

Question to Hamilton by Sam Husseini of the Institute for Public Accuracy: "Mr. Hamilton, can you clarify one of your recommendations, number 63, which called on the U.S. to 'assist the Iraqi leaders to reorganize the national oil industry as a commercial enterprise' and to 'encourage investment in Iraq's oil sector by the international community and by international energy companies.' Are you calling for some sort of privitization?"

Hamilton's full response: "Oil of course is the critical asset in Iraq. It furnishes a very large percentage of the GDP of Iraq. It furnishes a huge percentage of the total revenues of the government. We recommend many things with regard to the oil industry. I think there are as many recommendations on oil as any other feature of it, and you have to look at them as a package. Okay, thank you."

When Sen. Joseph Biden was asked if these ISG recommendations were "a de facto call for privatization or quasi-privatization" of Iraq's oil, he replied: "No, I think what it's a de facto call for is a political settlement." However, Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Oregon), when he was questioned about the oil recommendations, stated: "This is Iraq's oil, it's not our oil. They need to make these political decisions in how to distribute the resources among the population of Iraqis."

Hamilton, Biden and Smith spoke on Dec. 10.

Iraq's Draft Hydrocarbon Law Recommends PSAs
by Hassan Hafidh Dow Jones Newswires
Wednesday, December 06, 2006


AMMAN, Dec 06, 2006 (Dow Jones Newswires)
Iraq's first postwar draft hydrocarbon law recommends the government sign production sharing agreements and other service and buyback contracts to upgrade the country's war-ravaged oil industry.

The draft, a copy of which has been obtained by Dow Jones Newswires, states the Oil Ministry should set up a committee consisting of highly qualified experts to speed up the process of issuing tenders and signing contracts with international oil companies to develop Iraq's untapped oil fields.


The draft law states all decisions concerning Iraq's oil and gas exploration, production and transportation should be handled by the federal government in Baghdad, which is likely to anger Kurdish officials in northern Iraq.
The law is necessary for international companies to begin investment in Iraq's oil sector, which needs up to $20 billion to raise crude oil production to 3 million barrels a day from below 2 million b/d at present.

The new law could trigger the start of massive development of the country's oil fields, home to the world's largest reserves after Saudi Arabia and Iran.

"It is possible that the contractual formula is based on service contract, buyback contract or production sharing contract," the draft law states.

"These contractual formulas should be adjusted in a way that should serve the interests of the Republic of Iraq," the draft said.

The draft, which is still under debate by Iraqi officials, said "qualified Iraqi or non-Iraqi oil companies or individuals who possess suitable financial resources" should be allowed to bid for Iraq's oil contracts to carry out exploration or to develop oil fields.

The draft recommends 15 to 20 year contracts to develop Iraqi oil fields, including production sharing contracts. It states the contracts could be extended by five years if the government found it necessary in order to achieve better technical and financial returns.

The draft law also calls for the formation of an Iraqi National Oil Company to handle the country's oil production, exports and exploration.

"The cabinet should submit to the council of deputies (parliament) a draft resolution together with this oil law...that would establish the Iraqi National Oil Company. It should be owned by the government of Iraq," the draft states.

The law also calls for changes to the oil ministry's structure "to a manner that would enable the ministry to shoulder its new responsibilities stated by the law."

An Iraqi oil ministry official told Dow Jones Newswires Wednesday the new law proposes allowing - for the first time - local and international companies to carry out oil exploration in Iraq.

During the rule of ousted president Saddam Hussein exploration activities used to be carried out by the government only, he said.

The draft law is being debated by senior government officials before it is submitted to the parliament for final approval, the official added.

He named the officials discussing the final draft of the law as Deputy Prime Minister and head of the cabinet energy and oil committee Barham Saleh, Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani and the prime minister's adviser and former oil minister Thamer al-Ghadhban.

He said some of the articles of the law could be changed either by government officials or lawmakers.

It isn't known yet when exactly the law would be approved by the parliament. Oil Minister Shahristani had said it should be ready by the end of this year, but differences between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government, or KRG, on who should handle oil operations in Kurdistan could delay acceptance, oil analysts said Wednesday.

The Kurds are pressing for control of oil resources in their territories and a significant share of oil revenue, which has provoked anger in Baghdad.

"The powers of taking decisions on oil and gas exploration, development, production and transportation should be handled on behalf of the Iraqi people by the federal Iraqi government," the draft law stated.

The KRG - which estimates its resources total 45 billion barrels of oil equivalent - has already drafted its own hydrocarbon law that officials there say would trump Baghdad's version should the KRG not win at least the measure of authority over its resources it's seeking.

The Kurdish authority has already signed agreements with several small oil and gas companies, including U.S.-based Calibre Energy Inc. (CBRE), Norway's DetNorske Oljeselskap (DNO.OS) and Turkey's Petoil and has signed memoranda of understanding with Australia's Woodside Petroleum Ltd. (WPL.AU), Canada's Heritage Oil Corp. (HOC.T) and the U.K.'s Sterling Energy PLC (SEY.LN).

But oil officials in Baghdad have declared these agreements null and void and, without the hydrocarbon law, many oil majors have been reluctant to make deals, despite huge prospects and relative security in North Iraq.

However, contracts the Oil Ministry in Baghdad has already signed with international companies will remain valid, although they will need to be reviewed, the draft law stated. This will affect contracts to develop the Khormala Dome, Hemrin and Subba/Luhais medium-sized oil fields.

The draft law didn't spell out clearly if this article also covers contracts signed during Saddam Hussein's regime such as Lukoil's (LKOH.RS) deal to develop the giant West Qurna-2 oil field.

Copyright (c) 2006 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

Originally Posted by lewscrew

Hi everyone,

I have read through this a few times and decided to try
and put it into plain english to see if it makes more sense.

I believe what he is trying to say is:

Saddam had to go no matter how
difficult the task would be, and once we got him out
of Iraq there were a lot of mistakes made by the occupation
and the Iraqis themselves which really screwed things up big time
and slowed down the process or reform for the country, but
we chose to keep pushing forward to reach our salvation
with the help of a great display of arms from the many
friendly countries of Iraq.
We set our priorities for restoring the country's sovereignty,
we have created our new government and also have our own
constitution that is agreed upon by all Iraqis.
We have developed security and have our own Iraq army.
We are all very proud of what has been accomplished thus
far, most of these accomplishments were mearly dreams
only a few years ago.
But, we still feel like something is missing and believe
that things can still be so much better than they are now.
We know that terrorism and sabatage are a big reason
that we have not yet received the wonderful life that we are
promised and dearly deserve, however we feel it is mostly
caused by the continued delay of our government to
revalue our currency and finally hand out the funds that
were promised to so many of us so long ago.
Not only have you kept us from enjoying our life but we
are also afraid to step outside because your delays have
only helped terrorism and sabotage to grow stronger
instead of our economy.
You have the means to stop this bloodshed and to stabalize
our economy so we can stop all of the suffering and strengthen
our country against any remaining threats.
Now the time has come to respond to our cries, to make
our lives joyous and plentyful once more.
We want to live again and be proud of who we are and stand
tall with all of our brothers that can visualize what a great
nation we will be a part of together.
With the ending of this Holy month we are confident that
if you look at the evidence and ad up all of the numbers
you will also see that the only way for Iraq and Iraqis to
finally live the life they deserve is to correct our currency
to what it is actually worth and we will eccept no less.

Thanks, Lewscrew

Thank you, lewscrew, for taking the time to do this wonderful translation for us. This is the most beautiful, touching, and enjoyable translation I have ever read. This is spot on and says it all Great Job

Originally Posted by neno

These Two Questions Today, were over looked. I need some help in trying to answer them Gang.

that first one needs to be given to a translator in arabic form so we can get a more accurate translation than that one. its a mess.
can someone send the arabic form of the document to mr. g for tranlation or send it to me and ill forward it??
(i think lew took care of it if thats the same one)

the second one looks like a case for history search.

Originally Posted by yardbird

This isn't about the dinar, wasn't sure where to put it. GlobalFirepower.com Iraq gold reserves= 8,400,000,000 TheBostonChannel.com story, Tracking Saddam's Money.

ALMOST 8 AND A HALF BILLION WORTH OF GOLD???? BACK THAT DINAR BABY!!!

The 836 daily currency auction was held in the Central Bank of Iraq day Thursday 2006 / 12/ 28 so the results were as follows :

Details Notes
Number of banks 7 -----
Auction price selling dinar / US $ 1325 -----
Auction price buying dinar / US $ 1323 -----
Amount sold at auction price (US $) 6.655.000 -----
Amount purchased at Auction price (US $) 1.730.000
Total offers for buying (US $) 6.695.000 -----
Total offers for selling (US $) 1.730.000 -----

no change???

Announcement No.(836)

D.G. of Foreign Exchange Control

The 836 daily currency auction was held in the Central Bank of Iraq day Thursday 2006 / 12/ 28 so the results were as follows :

Details Notes
Number of banks 7 -----
Auction price selling dinar / US $ 1325 -----
Auction price buying dinar / US $ 1323 -----
Amount sold at auction price (US $) 6.655.000 -----
Amount purchased at Auction price (US $) 1.730.000
Total offers for buying (US $) 6.695.000 -----
Total offers for selling (US $) 1.730.000 -----





D.G. of Investments

Daily price Bulletin buying and selling Thursday 2006/12/28

Currency
Currency Code
Selling Price In IQD
Buying Price In IQD

US Dollar
USD
1325.000
1323.000

European Euro
EUR
1739.063
1738.193

Sterling Pound
GBP
2592.495
2591.199

Canadian Dollar
CAD
1141.258
1140.687

Swiss Frank
CHF
1081.368
1080.827

Sweetish Krone
SEK
192.330
192.234

Norwegian Krone
NOK
211.122
211.016

Denmark Krone
DKK
233.287
233.170

Japanese Yen
JPY
11.157
11.151


The above price represent reference rate and does not from any commitment on the Central Bank of Iraq.

Originally Posted by Raditz

The 836 daily currency auction was held in the Central Bank of Iraq day Thursday 2006 / 12/ 28 so the results were as follows :

Details Notes
Number of banks 7 -----
Auction price selling dinar / US $ 1325 -----
Auction price buying dinar / US $ 1323 -----
Amount sold at auction price (US $) 6.655.000 -----
Amount purchased at Auction price (US $) 1.730.000
Total offers for buying (US $) 6.695.000 -----
Total offers for selling (US $) 1.730.000 -----

no change???

and you notice the buy sell rates at the bottom are the same as the auction prices listed, not different as has been previously the case.

Which part used to be diff SGS?

hey sgs, what are your thoughts on the cbi saying the next auction is on the 7th jan after today and the rate will remain the same till then, sorry if this has been discussed brfore been very busy.

anyway does that balls up our rv with 2007 budget being done by then,

many thanks alan