Plus:
*Dana Gas ready to feed northern Iraq gas to Kurdish power plants
*Price of Baghdad black market fuel drops
*Iran-Iraq energy dealings during Ahmadinejad’s visit
*Spring is coming, but air conditioning is not
*Iraq Press Roundup
*Inside Iraqi Politics
Ireland’s Petrel Resources expects a production-sharing agreement for a deal it signed with Saddam Hussein for a block in Iraq’s western desert, United Press International reports. David Horgan, managing director of Petrel Resources, said the exploration and production deal will give the firm “a net production interest in Block 6 of 25 to 35 percent.”
Dana Gas says it’s nearly ready to feed natural gas from its northern Iraq field to power plants in Iraq’s Kurdistan region, UPI reports. The company, based in the United Arab Emirates, was awarded a service contract for the Kor Mor gas field in April 2007, as well as an agreement to study, along with its partner Crescent Petroleum, overall development of the Kurdistan Regional Government’s gas prospects. “We have been honored to work on this project to provide a complete solution of state-of-the-art gas field development, processing and transportation that is urgently required on a fast-track basis for electrical power generation for Iraqi citizens,” said Hamid Jafar, Dana Gas executive chairman and Crescent Petroleum’s chairman of the board.
The price of black market fuel in Baghdad has dropped in most neighborhoods but still remains up to double the state-set price, UPI reports. For more, see Iraq Slogger’s Price Check column.
Iraqi and Iranian energy ministers inaugurated construction of a power plant in Najaf, part of enhanced ties announced during the Iranian president’s visit, UPI reports. Iran has signed a number of deals to build power plants in Iraq and is in final talks to create pipelines sending Iraqi oil to Iran and refined products back to Iraq.
More on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadjinejad’s historic trip to Iraq and its impact:
Ahmadinejad’s Iraq visit bolsters Iran’s influence, Sam Dagher and Awadh al-Taiee report for The Christian Science Monitor.
Despite years of war between Iraq and Iran, Baghdad has warmly welcomed its Iranian guest, honored him respectfully and bid him a dutiful farewell. Meanwhile, Iraqis on a daily encounter with economic, living and gory assassinations are looking forward for the outcome of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad’s visit to Iraq that might end Iran’s interference in Iraq’s affairs, an accusation reiterated by Coalition Forces, Alsumaria TV reports.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lent $1 billion on Monday and told America to go home, as he wrapped up a two-day visit to Baghdad aimed at cementing Iran’s blossoming relationship with its one-time enemy, reports the Chicago Tribune’s Liz Sly
Iran plans to link its electrical grid with neighboring Iraq as part of another “extended area of cooperation” between the countries, the Iranian president announced during his historic visit to Iraq, CNN reports.
Baghdad Mayor Saber al-Aisawi has asked Iranian firms’ help to upgrade level of municipal services in the capital, Ahmad Rahima reports for Azzaman.The mayor has signed a joint agreement with Tehran under which Iranian firms are to start developing the city, home to more than six million people.
Spring is in the air, and Iraqis’ thoughts are turning to … air conditioning. That means they’re also thinking about the chronic electricity shortages that make the hot months unbearable for people who can’t afford to run generators day and night, the Los Angeles Times reports in its Iraq blog.
Society, Security & Politics
Inside Iraqi Politics, a new series by The Long War Journal.
Part 1: Examining the Executive Branch — an overview of broad political goals and various influences on progress by the executive branch, including the design of the government under the Iraqi Constitution, Iraqi administrative experience, rapid growth, and corruption.
Tomorrow — Part 2: A Look at Executive Branch Progress
Read Iraq’s editorial pages in the Iraq Press Roundup by UPI’s Hiba Dawood.
An Iraqi court has acquitted two top Shiite officials charged with orchestrating death squads which stormed into hospitals to snatch Sunni Arab patients and murder them, a court spokesman said Tuesday, Agence France-Presse reports.
In “The Iraq War and Asia: Assessing the Legacy,” The Center for Strategic & International Studies’ Senior Adviser and Japan Chair Michael J. Green argues that the Iraq war has not been as fundamental to Asian geopolitics as it has in the Middle East or Europe. Despite its unpopularity around the world, including in Asia, the war has not galvanized Asia’s rising powers to align to balance perceived U.S. unilateralism or caused a significant backlash against the norms of the U.S.-led neoliberal order in the wake of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. The Iraq war has had a second- and third-order impact on some of Washington’s strategic objectives for Asia, but it has not changed the basic need for a strong U.S. strategic presence in the region. The Iraq war has consumed U.S. attention, however, thus limiting Washington’s ability to reinforce positive developments in the region and to build on critical partnerships and institutions. This problem—a gradual and indirect result of the war—is not irreparable, but will require attention and recalibration.
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Iraq’s cabinet has given the green light to the Oil Ministry to sign agreements with international oil companies to help increase the nation’s crude output.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080305/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_oil_deals_1
The two-year deals, known as technical support agreements ( TSAs ), are designed to develop five producing fields to add 500,000 barrels per day to the country’s 2.4 million barrels per day output.
Last December, Royal Dutch Shell, British Petroleum, Exxon Mobil and Chevron submitted technical and financial proposals for the five fields and received counterproposals from the Iraqi side.
In January, representatives from the companies and Iraq met again in Amman, Jordan, and they will hold a third round of discussions later this month.
In Vienna, Iraq’s Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani said Iraq intends to compensate these companies with crude oil rather than in cash.
Speaking to reporters as he arrived for a meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, al-Shahristani said the Oil Ministry was still working on the compensation details with the Development Fund of Iraq, which is controlled by the United States and the United Nations.
Iraq’s average production was 2.4 million barrels per day in January while exports stood at an average of 1.92 million barrels per day. December’s exports averaged 1.81 million barrels per day.
The oil giants are among more than 70 international firms that met the ministry’s deadline of February 18 to compete to help develop Iraq’s oil reserves, seen as vital to providing the funds to rebuild the shattered country.
Iraq is in dire need of expertise from international oil companies to achieve the Oil Ministry’s target of 3 million barrels per day by the end of 2008. The country has been relying on a Saddam Hussein era natural resources law until Parliament approves a new oil law to regulate the international oil companies’ work and share Iraq’s oil resources among the country’s Shiites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds.
The current usa administration is working on two agreements on future ties with Iraq - one relating to US military forces there and another setting out the framework for diplomatic relations with Baghdad.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080304/pl_nm/iraq_usa_agreement_dc_1
Until now, the administration had spoken of one agreement to be reached with Baghdad before the current administration leaves office next January.
The plan for any document on future ties has stirred considerable concern among lawmakers and presidential candidates over whether it would lock in a long-term US military presence. Critics say the administration should seek congressional approval for security agreements with Iraq.
One congressional critic, Representative William Delahunt of Massachusetts, said he thought such a framework would require congressional approval.
Delahunt also said the planned status of forces agreement would contain an “authority to fight” that is not in most such deals, which tend to focus on things like criminal and tax liability of US soldiers stationed abroad.
“They are attempting, obviously, to circumvent Congress. The authority to use American military forces overseas is a shared power,” Delahunt told Reuters.
The United States currently has 160,000 occupation troops stationed in Iraq, plus close to 200,000 mercenaries on the usa taxpayer payroll.