Iraq wants U.S. Military Out - and Shell

Quagmire-infected Iraq doesn't just want U.S. soldiers out - it wants Western oil out, too.

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EXPECTATIONS that foreign companies can cash in on Iraq's oil riches are in doubt after a key parliamentary body in Baghdad pledged to "push Shell out" and halt a forthcoming licensing round.

The warning from the secretary of the Iraqi parliament's oil and gas committee, Jabir Khalifa Jabir, was seen by financial analysts yesterday as a serious threat to Western investment opportunities in a country that holds the second-largest oil reserves in the world.

Shell has been considered a front runner in the race to seize control of the Iraqi energy sector after signing a $US4 billion ($5.5 billion) deal to process and market gas from the south and ship it, possibly to Britain, as liquefied natural gas.

But the preliminary agreement - and a subsequent deal with China National Petroleum Corporation - were unconstitutional and detrimental to Iraq's economic interests, said Mr Jabir, who worked for more than 15 years at Iraq's state-run Southern Gas Company.

[...]

The Oil Ministry has said it does not need parliament's approval to sign new deals but Mr Jabir argued that Iraqi law 97 clearly states all arrangements of this nature must be passed by parliament.

The committee had studied the preliminary Shell deal for the past six months and all members have concluded that it is illegal, he said.

The deal with Shell and the wider oil licensing round have been controversial because many critics believed they were unduly influenced by the United States and Britain, who occupied the country after toppling Saddam Hussein in 2003. Critics saw the invasion as a "war for oil" and believed it would open the way for US and British oil companies to regain assets seized from them decades earlier through nationalisation.

- Brewskie

Xe, the Company Formerly Known As Blackwater

Blackwater - the infamous private contractor that's earned controversy for the conduct carried out by its contracted personnel - has revealed its latest PR attempt to cleanse a tarnished image: changing the company's name to "Xe," which is pronounced "z." Blackwater also announced it will change the current company logo (pictured above).

The private security firm has confronted a string of controversies since hiring out its armed contractors in Iraq; many of whom earn tens of thousands of dollars more than military personnel, and put in shorter commitments. One such incident occurred on December 24, 2006, when an armed Blackwater employee was accused shooting and killing a security guard of Iraqi vice president, Abdel Abul Mahdi. A prior incident - of the same year - occurred in the Baghdad Green Zone when an SUV, driven by Blackwater operatives, crashed into a U.S. Army Humvee. Blackwater guards disarmed the Army soldiers, and forced them to lie on the ground at gunpoint until they could disentangle their SUV from the wreck. In May 2007, Blackwater employees opened fire on the streets of Baghdad twice in two days. One of the incidents provoked a standoff between the security contractors, and Iraqi Interior Ministry commandos, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials.

Blackwater is believed to have 20,000-30,000 armed security personnel in Iraq. Its string of controversies sparked the book, "Blackwater: The Rise Of The World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army," by Jeremy Scahill.

- Brewskie