US 'forced' Shell and BASF to reject bid from Iran

[emad]

May 05, 2005
By Carl Mortished, International Business Editor

SHELL and BASF succumbed to pressure from Washington when they turned down a €4.4 billion (£3 billion) Iranian bid for Basell, their chemicals joint venture, said the managing director of Iran’s National Petrochemical Company (NPC).

Mohammed Reza Nematzadeh blamed the decision by Shell and BASF not to proceed with the offer on intense lobbying by US officials anxious to keep up the pressure on Iran to drop its nuclear fuel programme. “Although NPC won all aspects of the Basell tender, due to US pressures we are unofficially told Iran cannot buy Basell,” Mr Nematzadeh told ISNA , the Iranian news agency.

“The enemy has always inflicted harm on us and this time the United States deprived us of the benefit of buying Basell.”

Shell and BASF are believed to be close to a deal with Haldia Petrochemical, an Indian-Russian buyer that is backed by Purnendu Chatterjee, an Indian entrepreneur, and Leonard Blavatnik, a Russian metal and minerals tycoon.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,173-1598150,00.html

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,173-1598150,00.html

[trotsky]

1. Now watch a subsidiary of Halliburton win the deal.

Just watch.

[DrDebug]

2. But a Haldia is allowed to buy it

Marvin P. Bush, one of George W. Bush's three younger brothers, is co-founder and partner in Winston Partners, a private investment firm in Alexandria, Va. Winston Partners in turn is part of a larger venture capital entity called the Chatterjee Group, headed by venture capitalist Purnendu Chatterjee. (Venture capital firms provide money to start-up businesses and other companies, usually in return for equity and some managerial say in the company.)

http://www.makethemaccountable.com/burns/021129_BushFamilySecurityPie.htm

That's one reason

Donations by Blavatnik, Leonard
REPUBLICAN FEDERAL COMMITTEE OF PENNSYLVANIA (R) $1,875
MICHIGAN REPUBLICAN PARTY (R) $2,783
2004 JOINT STATE VICTORY COMMITTEE (R) $27,500
etc. etc.
Some money to Hillary Clinton as well, but most to the Republican Party

http://www.newsmeat.com/fec/bystate_detail.php?st=&zip=10028&last=Blavatnik&first=Leonard

And that's the second reason

[Frederik]

3. That's friggin amazing

These people never cease to amaze don't they.

[Robbien]

4. And in return, we taxpayers will pay oil companies through the Energy

Bill laden with enough pork to offset Shell's lost business in Iran.

[jmowreader]

5. Lost business isn't what we're talking about here

Shell and BASF jointly own a petrochemical venture in Iran called Basell, which the Iranian government wanted to purchase. The US government talked them out of it.

The Iranian government is the last group on earth who should own a state-of-the-art petrochemicals business. Can you imagine what would happen if a country with a history of making and using chemical warfare agents was to become the owner of a first-rate chemical plant?

I'm kinda surprised that Bush didn't insist the sale be allowed to take place. Check this shit out: Shell is based in the Netherlands. BASF (im Deutsch: "Badische Anilin und Soda Fabrik"; in English "Aniline and Soda Manufacturers of Baden") is based in Germany. Both the German and the Dutch governments are on record as being against Bush's illegal oily misadventure. Now! We know Bush wants to go to war against Iran, and he's worn out the anti-French hysteria. Therefore, he needs a new bogeyman...Holland looks pretty good to me. And ya know somethin'? If the Dutch sold Iran a chemical plant, he'd have a much better bogeyman in the Netherlands than he ever did in the French. "Actively aiding and abetting the enemy" sounds much worse than "said going to war against Iraq was a good idea."