World-News

Nick Turse, TomDispatch.com, writes: "According to recent reports, the proposed Iraqi service contracts, which may be paid off in cash or crude oil, will be worth $500 million each. That is roughly what the Pentagon paid out on June 18 alone - the day before the Times broke its story about Big Oil's return to Iraq - for natural gas and aviation fuel. Over half the total amount, in excess of $268 million, was handed over to one of the oil giants set to benefit from the Iraq deal: BP (formerly British Petroleum). Only days earlier, two of the other majors from the coterie of potential no-bid contractors, ExxonMobil and Chevron, nabbed contracts from the DoD - in ExxonMobil's...

http://www.truthout.org/article/the-iraqi-oil-ministrys-new-fave-five



Iraq's Complicated Oil Fields

Spencer Ackerman, of The Washington Independent: "In mid-June, Iraq's oil minister, Husain Shahristani, announced that he would grant no-bid development contracts for Iraq's oil fields to Western oil giants. Exxon, Shell, BP and Total stood to earn billions off the deals, since Iraq possesses nearly as much potential oil reserve -- and perhaps even more -- as Saudi Arabia, the nation with the world's most oil. Within days, The New York Times reported that a team of US State Department advisers urged Shahristani and other ministry officials to grant the contracts to the oil barons."

http://www.truthout.org/article/iraqs-complicated-oil-fields



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