Just off the top of my head, here are some interesting things that happened over the past month or so that have been obviously overshadowed by the happenings in South Ossetia / Caucasus. Many of these are energy-related and can be considered footnotes to the new Great Game (I hate this title but I guess that's the one people are using now ?).

- Iraq voided Lukoil's contract saying something about it being "unfair."

- Kazakhstan introduced an oil extraction tax (I think up to "18% of market value"). Doesn't affect PSAs and Tengiz but, still, a negative to the western multinationals

- Several Australian officials opposed uranium sales to Russia. Russian officials responded, saying, in effect, that if Russian businesses find trouble in Australia, Australian business in Russia will suffer (BHP, for instance, is banking on Russia and stands to be a major player in Russian mining). A few days later, an industry group representing major Australian miners said that Russia can be trusted with Australian uranium

- Russia and Uzbekistan agreed to build a new natural gas pipeline to pump up to 30 bcm of Turkmen and Uzbek gas a year to Russia

- Matthew Bryza's wife said something in the WSJ about Turkey choosing Russia over NATO

- Sergei Ivanov joined Silvio Berlusconi and Muammer Gaddafi in Benghazi, Libya, presumably discussing cooperation on a new gas pipeline to Europe

- Armenia said that Iran will supply 100% of its gas needs by 2010, partly in exchange for electricity

- Gazprom signed a major energy deal with Nigeria

This entry was posted by Colleen, on 9.04.2008. You can leave your response.