At 03/11/02 08:12 -0800, you wrote:
Carve-up of oil riches beginsUS plans to ditch industry rivals and force end of Opec, write Peter Beaumont and Faisal Islam Sunday November 3, 2002 The Observer The leader of the London-based Iraqi National Congress, Ahmed Chalabi, has met executives of three US oil multinationals to negotiate the carve-up of Iraq's massive oil reserves post-Saddam. Disclosure of the meetings in October in Washington - confirmed by an INC spokesman - comes as Lord Browne, the head of BP, has warned that British oil companies have been squeezed out of post-war Iraq even before the first shot has been fired in any US-led land invasion.
The existence of this article in the Observer, which will be read by UK ministers, presumably with support from BP, suggests that the British government may also be concerned about US policy. It is presumably hoping to influence the conference in Sandringham.
There is no counter spin from the British government to suggest that the controversy will all be resolved. The UK is presumably trying to bargain for leverage. We can only guess how arkward the discussions are behind the scenes. But presumably one of the bargaining chips is whether the UK supplies a nominal few percent of the total invasion force.
Not quite the intrepid imperialist style of William Knox D'Arcy, who founded the original company that became BP.
Chris Burford
London
