PDVSA says Exxon's asset freeze based on fantasy

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Reuters

PDVSA says Exxon's asset freeze based on fantasy
Sat Mar 1, 2008 12:40am GMT

By Tom Bergin

LONDON (Reuters) - Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA told a UK court on Friday that a $12 billion (6 billion pound) freeze on its assets should not have been granted to Exxon Mobil (XOM.N: Quote, Profile, Research) as the oil major's arguments were "sheer fantasy land."

PDVSA lawyer Gordon Pollock said the amount frozen was excessive. He said a claim that PDVSA would try to hide its assets was not credible and the English court which awarded the freeze had exceeded its jurisdiction.

Pollock said the $12 billion figure Exxon asked to be frozen was based on adding up all the projected cash flows of the Venezuelan heavy oil project seized by President Hugo Chavez as part of his nationalisation drive, without any discount made for the fact they run to 2035.

He said this argument was "simply economically and financially illiterate."



Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUKL2927885420080301?rpc=401&

[Demeter]

1. That I'll Believe!

[Peace Patriot]

2. Oh, I think it's far more than a fantasy. I think it's part of a war plan...

"The Smart Way to Beat Tyrants Like Chávez," by Donald Rumsfeld, 12/1/07
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/30/AR2007113001800.html

Rumsfeld's been busy, in his "retirement," planning Oil War II: South America. He urges economic warfare against Venezuela (and Exxon Mobil immediately puts its corporate hand up and volunteers), and (after they have destabilized Venezuela, and also Bolivia) "swift" U.S. action in support of "friends and allies" in South America (fascist thugs planning coups).

Of course, Venezuela's lawyers can't say this in court. But they know it. So does most of South America--which has gone way off the U.S. "reservation" and elected leftist (majorityist) governments in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Chile and Nicaragua--with strong new alliances formed among the Bolivarians (the first four) and between the Bolivarians and the other leftist governments. The people who don't know are the people in whose name Oil War II has already started, whose money has been hijacked to this purpose (billions in Bush/U.S. military and political aid to fascist elites), and whose sons and daughters in the military could well be fighting in the jungles and mountains of the Andes this year--the people of the U.S.

Exxon Mobil can spare a billion or two. Last quarter, they reported the highest profits of any U.S. corporation, ever. And they don't want fair compensation, which Venezuela offered to them (and which Norway's Statoil, France's Total, British BP and even Chevron have agreed to). No, their goal is destabilization. This is the opening shot in Rumsfeld's new war. Be warned. And guess who chimes right in, totally in tune with war criminal Rumsfeld...

"If I am entrusted with the presidency, America will have the courage, once again, to meet with our adversaries. But I will not be penciling in the leaders of Iran or North Korea or Venezuela or Cuba on the presidential calendar without preconditions, until we have assessed through lower level diplomacy, the motivations and intentions of these dictators. --Hillary Clinton (at GW University, 2/25/08)
http://www.hillaryclinton.com/news/speech/view/?id=6196

Obama's statements about Chavez (read: Oil War II) have been more ambiguous and circumspect, but not particularly comforting. Neither Clinton nor Obama seem to understand that Chavez is NOT a "tyrant," has run a scrupulously lawful, elected government for ten years, and has a 70% approval rating. What do the Venezuelans know that our political establishment is deliberately hiding from us? That Venezuela has transparent elections, and we do not? That the poor majority deserves REAL representation of their interests in government?

I don't think Obama would go along with Oil War II. But I'm not sure. And clearly Hillary Clinton would. If she thinks that Hugo Chavez is a "dictator," then she's in Exxon Mobil's camp. And, if ever there was motive by the rightwing Bushite corporations who 'count' our votes with "trade secret" code, to continue the hijacking of our government and military for corporate resource wars--beyond what they did in 2004--this is it--to put Clinton or McCain in the White House. And people here won't even know what the real reason is. It would not be to invade Iran. It would be to invade Venezuela and Bolivia, and STOP this democracy and social justice movement in the Andes region in particular, where all the oil is. Iran is too well-defended, and China simply wouldn't put up with it. (And our own military balked at nuking Iran.) But destabilizing the Andes democracies, and responding to the plea from fascists elites for U.S. support of the rightwing separatist movement in Bolivia (to split off the gas/oil rich provinces), thus drawing Chavez and Venezuela into the fray, in defense of Bolivia and the government of Evo Morales, and creating havoc, and grabbing those oil fields, and installing fascist governments that will do Exxon Mobil's bidding?

Very doable--as Rumsfeld said of the war on Iraq. He will fail. (The alliances among the leftist governments of South America, and the desire for democracy and independence among the people, are too strong.) But that has never stopped Rumsfeld from killing people and causing suffering and grief, and trying to take what advantage from it he can gain, in war profits or stolen oil fields.

[slipslidingaway]

3. K&R thanks n/t