D'oh!!! (Or: The guile of the Dragon and the seething frustration of American and Western Multinational Oil Barons)

AP (via Raw Story):

Iraq and China are close to re-signing a $1.2 billion oil deal that was called off after the 2003 U.S. invasion, an Iraqi Oil Ministry official said Thursday.

Saddam Hussein's government signed a deal with the state-owned China National Petroleum Corp. to develop the billion-barrel al-Ahdab oil field, despite U.N. sanctions that barred direct dealings with Iraq's oil industry.

Beijing was waiting for the sanctions to end when the U.S. invasion overthrew Saddam. The two countries restarted talks in October 2006.

"We are expecting that the next round of discussions, due to be held in April, will finish the negotiations," the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release information.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it had no information about the talks.

Mmmmmm hmmmmmm.

Officials with CNPC and China's Commerce Ministry could not be reached for comment.

Really?

Meanwhile, in another part of town...

On Wednesday, another oil official said that Iraq's Cabinet has given the nod to the Oil Ministry to sign agreements with international oil companies to help increase the nation's crude output.

The two-year deals, known as technical support agreements, or TSAs, are designed to develop five producing fields that would add 500,000 barrels per day to the country's 2.4 million barrels per day output.


"But that's not enough! That sixth field in Wasit should have been ours as well!!!"

Sorry, chums.

In memoriam

Breaking cover and revealing my geek/gamer roots, but one must give the appropriate props to one of the masters...

Courtesy of Penny Arcade: