The United Nations took moves Tuesday to halt what it alleges to be “unauthorized Iraqi oil exports.”
It said it will issue forms to tanker personnel charged with oil loading in order to check that cargoes leaving Iraq are headed for "approved" destinations, according to Oil and Gas Journal Online.
Under the plan, UN oil monitors will distribute forms verifying the export's destination with the aim of "preventing the diversion of Iraqi crude oil to a destination other than that authorized" under the Iraqi oil-for-food program, the UN Office of the Iraq Program was quoted as saying.
According to an OIP report issued Tuesday, Iraq exported 1.8 million b/d of oil last week, earning the country an estimated 284 million euros.
On top of this figure, however, according to Leo Drollas, senior analyst at the London-based Center for Global Energy Studies, Iraq is "illegally" exporting around 150,000 b/d to Syria, with another 25,000 b/d being smuggled out via the Persian Gulf. A further 100,000 b/d is shipped to Jordan, although this export has the "tacit" approval of the UN.
Drollas noted that such a low-tech system of export verification "will not be easy to police," and is likely to be resisted by oil traders in the region who want the "flexibility" of not having to declare destinations for cargoes of crude oil.
However, Syria has agreed to put the pipeline under the supervision of the UN, and reports have said that the flow of Iraqi oil to Syrian ports has decreased tremendously since the February visit to Damascus by US Secretary of State Collin Powell, who reportedly asked the Syrian to stop the deals with Baghdad.
The oil-for-food program, under which Baghdad can buy relief supplies using a portion of its oil revenues, was begun in late 1996 as part of an initiative aimed at easing aims the impact of UN sanctions imposed on the country in 1990 following the Gulf War – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
