Exxon Is Demanding Ten Times its Investment, Says Venezuelan Oil Minister

[Joanne98]

The maximum compensation ExxonMobil should receive for its nationalized 41.6% stake in the Cerro Negro Orinoco River belt project is $1.2 billion, the Venezuelan Minister of Energy and Petroleum and President of the Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA, Rafael Ramírez, announced yesterday. This is a tenth of Exxon's claim to $12 billion of PDVSA's assets, which were temporarily frozen after the transnational oil company won a series of court orders in Britain, the Netherlands, and the Dutch Antilles earlier this month.

In a speech before the Venezuelan National Assembly, the minister argued that Exxon's $12 billion compensation claim is exaggerated, revealing that $5 billion was the largest amount to which the company had ever aspired in previous negotiations. This prompted an Exxon Mobil lawyer to complain that it was inappropriate to have revealed such information.

Ramírez said the U.S. oil company's aggressive tactic of freezing assets outside the arbitration of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) constituted "another step in the economic war against our nation." The minister reiterated his accusation that Exxon is engaging in "judicial terrorism" by attacking the main source of funding for Venezuela's social programs over an investment PDVSA records show to have been worth only $750 million when it was nationalized.

ExxonMobil is "pointing its sword toward destabilizing the government of President Hugo Chávez," the former president of the Venezuelan Chamber of Petroleum, Hernández Raffalli, proclaimed in a forum on the Exxon case Wednesday. "What is at stake is the sovereignty of the country and its natural resources."
http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news/3164

[sam sarrha]

1. add up the profit they made off Venezuela, subtract what they want, send em a bill...!!

[Joe Chi Minh]

5. That's more like it!

[Peace Patriot]

2. Did Donald Rumsfeld write this 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: Economic warfare (kind of like the sanctions against Iraq - cripple the country, make it defenseless), then...as Rumsfeld puts it, "swift" U.S. action in support of "friends and allies" in South America (fascist thugs planning coups).

Exxon Mobile's grasp at Venezuela'a assets: stage 1.

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I must say I'm struck by the quality of representatives and diplomats that Venezuela has speaking for it around the world. Smart, knowledgeable, well-spoken and, at the same time, gutsy, direct-speaking Chavistas. They nail issues very well, with facts and logic.

I wish I was a political cartoonist. Monstrous oil moguls from Exxon-Mobile stealing food right out of poor Venezuelan children's mouths. That's what it amounts to. That's what it IS. And with bloodsoaked Rumsfeld lurking in the background, like Mr. Death, bristling with bullets, missiles and torture implements, beady eyes red with war lust. There's probably a cartoon like this somewhere in the Venezuelan press, but not in English (tho pix = 1,000w).

[yurbud]

3. can you imagine if US cabinet member were fighting for us to get fair share of income from oil?

I can't either.

[trthnd4jstc]

4. Exxon should be stopped.

Exxon has been nothing less than a tyrant, amongst tyrants, of the Oil Industry. The WTO ought to get involved. End Tyranny!

[bemildred]

6. Give them nothing until they make nice. nt