18 July 2008 Feeling buoyant about beating back Al-Qaeda in Iraq and reining in Iraqi militias in southern Iraq and Baghdad, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is now taking the initiative on the economic and diplomatic fronts. He wants to spur the much-delayed reconstruction efforts, including those in the oil sector, by moving the decision-making process from bureaucratic ministries to a new council with powers to award contracts. He also…
Author: Ruba Husari
IOF Editor
Iraq: Shell’s Entry Plan
2 May 2008 Royal Dutch Shell has never been shy when considering Iraq’s huge potential. Even when the country was under UN sanctions, company officials quietly traveled to and from Baghdad, fostering relations with oil ministry officials. Since the US-led invasion of 2003, it has pursued opportunities more aggressively, with a three-pronged strategy targeting the upstream in the north and south, and the gas sector. Now, Shell is seeking to…
Iraq: New Models
14 March 2008 After struggling for five years to restore crude oil production to prewar levels, Baghdad is taking a pragmatic look at ways to involve international oil companies in developing its resources, sidestepping an internal debate over whether production sharing agreements (PSA) — the model preferred by Big Oil — are suited to Iraq. While discussions are ongoing with international oil companies, and between the Iraqi oil ministry and…
Buying Time
29 September 2006 It will be 2008, at the earliest, before Iraq’s southern provinces unite to form the giant oil-rich federal region that some Iraqi groups are calling for. That’s the deal reached this week by Shiite and Sunni lawmakers which, for now at least, averts further ethnic and religious strife over a Shiite-backed law outlining the mechanisms whereby Iraq’s provinces can form autonomous regions. But the arrangement, brokered by…