Iraqi Union Set to Strike over Oil Law

snip>>

http://priceofoil.org/2007/05/09/iraqi-union-set-to-strike-over-oil-law/

"Iraq’s largest oil workers’ trade union will strike tomorrow, in protest at the controversial oil law currently being considered by the Iraqi parliament. The move threatens to stop all oil exports from Iraq.

The oil law proposes giving multinational companies the primary role in developing Iraq’s huge untapped oilfields, under contracts lasting up to 30 years. Oil production in Iraq, like in most of the Middle East, has been in the public sector since the 1970s.

The Union, representing 26,000 oil workers, has held three previous
strikes since 2003, each time stopping exports, for up to two days at a
time. The announcement of the strike has spurred negotiations with the
Ministry of Oil, which are ongoing.

Imad Abdul-Hussain, Federation Deputy Chair of the IFOU said: “The
central government must be in total ownership and complete control of
production and the export of oil”. He warned against the controversial
Production Sharing Agreements favored by foreign companies, saying
other forms of co-operation with foreign companies would be acceptable
but not at the level of control and profiteering indicated in the
current Oil Law."

Look for increased violence, and an unusually high death toll among this group of "terrorists."

No doubt Cheney and Rove are working on it right now...

Have the Queen over for dinner: See? We're legitimate, other countries recognize us as being in charge!

Go to see the damage in Kansas: See? We care, Bush is workin' hard for the Murkin people.

Cheney to Iraq: See? It's safe. Even Big Dick can go there in complete safety...

None of those things have anything at all to do with photo ops for the masses.

Nope.

Not a bit of that. With all the death, destruction, and problems in the world, it would be inappropriate for the President and his administration to do such foolish and irresponsible things, right?

Right?




Right?





Why isn't anyone disagreeing with me? :shrug:

:sarcasm:

the Oil Law is one of their benchmarks....

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/kucinich-seeks-to-strip-o_b_43398.html

<snip>


But Representative Dennis Kucinich is asking for something to be removed from the supplemental - the "benchmark" that requires the Iraqi government to pass a new oil law.

As Antonia Juhasz pointed out in an op-ed yesterday in the New York Times, the Bush Administration has touted the positive aspect of the draft Iraq oil law currently before Iraq's parliament: that it seeks to share oil revenues fairly among Iraq's regions and ethnic groups.

But until recently there has been very little discussion in the U.S. of what the draft oil law means for the relationship of foreign companies to Iraq's oil reserves. Critics, including Iraqi labor unions, charge that the law will privatize Iraq's oil reserves into the hands of multinational oil companies.

In a letter to fellow Members of Congress, Representative Kucinich writes:

The primary function of the oil law currently being considered by the Iraqi government will be to open Iraqi oil fields to private foreign companies, depriving the Iraqi people of a necessary source of national income.

Iraq Supplemental Bill? I've called my reps and the leadership offices as well for an explanation but none has been forthcoming?

Kucinich Statement on the Iraq Supplemental Conference Report HR 1591

http://kucinich.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=63687


"Washington, Apr 25 - WASHINGTON, DC — Following passage of the supplemental conference report this evening, Congressman Dennis Kucinich released the following statement:

This “Supplemental” is a plan to extort Iraq’s oil wealth under the guise of a plan to end the war. Funds for the security of the Iraqi government are contingent upon Iraq giving up control of oil. This legislation is a repugnant, high pressure tactic to force Iraq to pass a “hydrocarbon act” which will effectively privatize the oil wealth of Iraq. The key deception is that the hydrocarbon act, which sounds like an environmental law, lets Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds “share” whatever is left after US oil companies take unconscionable profits. This bill is not a plan for peace. It is blood for oil. It is a guarantee of more war and the continued U.S. occupation of Iraq."

amended.

"(Sec. 1710) Withholds, with specified exceptions, 50% of certain economic and narcotics law enforcement funds under this Act for Iraq until the President certifies to the Senate Committees on Appropriations and Foreign Relations and the House Committees on Appropriations and Foreign Affairs that the government of Iraq has: (1) enacted a hydrocarbon law that equitably shares oil revenues among all Iraqis;"

for the workers