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| Subject: Billions in Iraq oil missing | |
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Author: Bev |
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Date Posted: 08:46:37 05/12/07 Sat In reply to: Stephen 's message, "This is interesting article on Iraqi oil, or lack thereof, since the US invasion." on 14:27:02 05/07/07 Mon this is a 2 page article i am posting the first page . http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/12/world/middleeast/12oil.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin in Oil Missing in Iraq, U.S. Study Says Sign In to E-Mail or Save This By JAMES GLANZ Published: May 12, 2007 Between 100,000 and 300,000 barrels a day of Iraq’s declared oil production over the past four years is unaccounted for and could have been siphoned off through corruption or smuggling, according to a draft American government report. Missing Oil Using an average of $50 a barrel, the report said the discrepancy was valued at $5 million to $15 million daily. The report does not give a final conclusion on what happened to the missing fraction of the roughly two million barrels pumped by Iraq each day, but the findings are sure to reinforce longstanding suspicions that smugglers, insurgents and corrupt officials control significant parts of the country’s oil industry. The report also covered alternative explanations for the billions of dollars worth of discrepancies, including the possibility that Iraq has been consistently overstating its oil production. Iraq and the State Department, which reports the numbers, have been under relentless pressure to show tangible progress in Iraq by raising production levels, which have languished well below the United States goal of three million barrels a day. Virtually the entire economy of Iraq is dependent on oil revenues. The draft report, expected to be released within the next week, was prepared by the United States Government Accountability Office with the help of government energy analysts, and was provided to The New York Times by a separate government office that received a review copy. The accountability office declined to provide a copy or to discuss the draft. Paul Anderson, a spokesman for the office, said only that “we don’t discuss draft reports.” But a State Department official who works on energy issues said that there were several possible explanations for the discrepancy, including the loss of oil through sabotage of pipelines and inaccurate reporting of production in southern Iraq, where engineers may not properly account for water that is pumped along with oil in the fields there. “It could also be theft,” the official said, with suspicion falling primarily on Shiite militias in the south. “Crude oil is not as lucrative in the region as refined products, but we’re not ruling that out either.” Iraqi and American officials have previously said that smuggling of refined products like gasoline and kerosene is probably costing Iraq billions of dollars a year in lost revenues. The smuggling of those products is particularly feared because officials believe that a large fraction of the proceeds go to insurgent groups. Crude oil is much more difficult to smuggle because it must be shipped to refineries and turned into the more valuable refined products before it can be sold on the market. The Shiite militia groups hold sway around the rich oil fields of southern Iraq, which dominate the country’s oil production, the State Department official said. For that reason, he said, the Shiite militias are more likely to be involved in theft there than the largely Sunni insurgents, who are believed to benefit mostly from smuggling refined products in the north. In the south, the official said, “There is not an issue of insurgency, per se, but it could be funding Shia factions, and that could very well be true.” “That would be a concern if they were using smuggling money to blow up American soldiers or kill Sunnis or do anything that could harm the unity of the country,” the official said. The report by the accountability office is the most comprehensive look yet at faltering American efforts to rebuild Iraq’s oil and electricity sectors. For the analysis of Iraq’s oil production, the accountability office called upon experts at the Energy Information Administration within the United States Department of Energy, which has long experience in analyzing oil production and exports worldwide. Erik Kreil, an oil expert at the information administration who is familiar with the analysis, said a review of industry figures around the world — exports, refinery figures and other measures — could not account for all the oil that Iraq says it is producing. The administration also took into account how much crude oil was consumed internally, to do things like fuel Iraqi power plants and refine into gasoline and other products. When all those uses of the oil were taken into consideration, Mr. Kreil said, Iraq’s stated production figures did not add up. “Either they’re producing less, or they’re producing what they say and the difference is completely unaccounted for in any of the places we think it should go,” Mr. Kreil said. “Either it’s overly optimistic, or it’s unaccounted for.” [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |