Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Big oil has crude designs on Iraq wealth - report

Big oil firms may rob Iraq of billions and grab control of its oilfields unless ordinary Iraqis can have a greater say in how their country's riches are tapped, U.S. and British campaigners said on Tuesday.
Big oil is being lured by the Production Sharing Agreement (PSA), promoted by Washington and London, which gives them huge returns on investment, but deprives Iraq of up to $194 billion (113 billion pounds), according to "Crude Designs: The rip-off of Iraq's oil wealth".
"Under the influence of the U.S. and UK, powerful politicians and technocrats in the Iraqi oil ministry are pushing to hand all Iraq's undeveloped fields to multinational oil companies, to be developed under production sharing agreements," said Greg Muttitt, the report's author.

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