Chevron Corporation wants a cut of Iraq’s oil fields. Chevron, the San Ramon oil giant and Total SA of France have agreed to split up the oil on Majnoon fields in Iraq. The only problem is that Iraq doesn’t want to let them do that.
The take-over and development of these oil reserves by Chevron can’t happen until Iraq passes a law governing foreign investment in its oil industry. And even though Chevron has been bribing them since Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003 with technical assistance, nothing can be done without this new law being passed.
Despite intense pressure from Washington the Iraqi leaders have resisted being led down the golden path before they agree on a framework for sharing the country's vast oil wealth.
The oil fields of Majnoon are estimated to be either the second or third largest in the world. A lot of the country has not yet been thoroughly explored so there might be lots more oil and natural gas hidden there.
Before we invaded Iraq, Majnoon was putting out and average of 2.5 million barrels per day. This past June, the most recent month with available data, 1.98 million barrels a day was produced.
"Majnoon would be a real prize," said Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy research fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute. "People do not find that many million-barrel-a-day fields."
"This is an extremely sensitive issue for the Iraqi people, and it unites the Sunnis, the Shiites and the Kurds,” said Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Global Exchange. “They don't want the oil controlled by foreign companies".
The Iraqi public is very suspicious of any foreign involvement in their oil industry. Many view the war as an attempt by the United States and its allies to gain control of the country's oil. Sixty-three percent of Iraqis surveyed in a recent poll want to retain control of their oil fields.
Global Exchange, one of the groups that commissioned the poll, said that the Iraqi invasion was little more than an oil grab.
The California Curmudgeon
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