biz.yahoo.com Thursday March 13, 3:07 pm ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) - World oil prices plunged more than 4 percent on Thursday as the United States said efforts to garner support for a new U.N. resolution on Iraq could extend into next week, potentially further delaying a Middle East war.

News that the Japanese government plans to sell 300,000 barrels per day from its state reserves should U.S.-led forces begin attacking Iraq, according to a Nihon Keizai Shimbun report, added to the day's slide, traders said.

U.S. light crude was $1.68 down at $36.15 a barrel. London benchmark Brent crude oil fell $1.44 a barrel to $32.47 a barrel.

Oil prices are still up 16 percent this year on concerns that a war in Iraq, which itself ships around 4 percent of world oil exports, could upset oil supplies from other producers in the Middle East.

Prices fell as the White House said on Thursday diplomatic efforts to secure U.N consensus on a new resolution on Iraq could spill over into next week.

Secretary of State Colin Powell told a congressional committee there may be no vote at all on the resolution, a sign that Washington fears it may not get enough support.

A German government source said compromise in the U.N. Security Council on Iraq was unlikely, even if a vote is put off until next week.

Further relief for soaring prices came from an end to freezing U.S. temperatures which have supported heating oil prices at near record levels in recent weeks.

Prices rose on Wednesday as the fall in U.S. stocks combined with worries that oil cartel OPEC (News - Websites)would not be able to compensate for lost Iraqi exports in event of war.

Latest U.S. data showed crude inventories falling last week to a 27-year low. There were also sharp drops in gasoline inventories, which ought to be growing as stockbuilding starts for the summer driving season.

Analysts say core oil stocks are now 89 million barrels below normal. "Given the reported ramping of OPEC production and the continued recovery of Venezuelan production, the shortfall is shocking," SG Securities said in a research note.

OPEC STEPS UP OUTPUT

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries has stepped up output this year to cover an outage of crude from Venezuela, where an anti-government strike brought production to little more than a trickle in December and January.

Venezuela, normally the fifth-biggest exporter providing about 13 percent of U.S. oil imports, has increased shipments of crude and oil products though rebel oil workers say production is still less than half of normal levels.

Analysts say timing is now key for the war because oil demand is generally two million barrels lower in the second quarter of the year as spring advances and the loss of Iraqi crude will not be as acutely felt as now.

The West's energy watchdog, the International Energy Agency (IEA), says the OPEC cartel likely lacks enough capacity to compensate immediately for the loss of Iraqi and Kuwaiti oil.

OPEC, however, has pledged to guarantee supplies should war break out and Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi reiterated on Thursday OPEC's ability to deliver oil in case of war in Iraq.

The Nihon Kezai report said Japan will consider releasing oil with the United States, regardless of what the (IEA) advises. Japan and the U.S. are members of the 26-nation IEA, the energy watchdog for industrialized nations that is based in Paris.

The IEA has said that it will allow OPEC to try to cover any shortages in war before it considers, as a last resort, releasing inventories from emergency stockpiles held in consumer nations.

Those reserves, built after the 1974 Arab oil embargo, were last used in the 1990-91 Gulf war after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.

www.guardian.co.uk By John Aglionby Thursday March 13, 2003

Two years after coming to power with the first ever simple majority in Thailand's political history, populist prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra looks stronger than ever. A spot of coalition building cemented his grip on the lower house and supporters have recently engineered themselves into key leadership positions in the supposedly neutral upper house.

Meanwhile the police colonel-turned telecoms billionaire has engineered a much faster recovery from the 1997 Asian economic crisis than his equally mauled neighbours - growth last year was 4.9 per cent, one of the highest in Asia and Thailand's £3 billion loan to the IMF is all-but repaid.

Populist policies like offering extremely cheap health care to the masses, soft loans to all the 70,000 villages, a debt moratorium for farmers and super-low interest rates have kept him riding high in the polls. This was cemented in January when he announced he was going to declare war onmethamphetamines or speed, known locally as "yaa baa" [crazy pill], which has taken a grip on 10 per cent of the adult population in only a few years and the situation is getting worse.

"What Thaksin has brought is decisive leadership and he has captured the imagination of the Thai population," said a spokesman for Thaksin's ruling Thai Rak Thai [Thais love Thais] party, Suranand Vejjajiva.

And later this year Mr Thaksin is due to host the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders summit, an event that should propel Thailand into the global spotlight. What more could a nation want of its prime minister?

How about respect for the rule of law? A maintenance of checks and balances on executive power? Upholding human rights? A free press? The right to offer constructive criticism?

For the events of the past six weeks should dispel all doubts, critics argue, that far from reforming Thailand into a developed, democratic nation, Mr Thaksin is doing whatever he feels necessary to perpetuate his own power and ensure re-election, a rarity in Thai politics. Fears abound that a new absolutism is emerging in Thailand, only this time the uniforms are no longer the green fatigues of the past military dictators but the sharp suits and ties of the new corporate rulers.

Much writing was already on the wall before the war on drugs began on February 1. In his first year in office Mr Thaksin severely undermined the credibility and effectiveness of both the National Counter Corruption Commission and the Election Commission, by engineering a victory against the former when he successfully appealed against a corruption conviction, and bringing the latter closer into his fold by replacing all the outgoing members when their terms expired.

Parliament's upper house, the senate, was the next target. It is supposed to be one of the main counterbalances to executive power but Mr Thaksin has filled most of its key posts with lackeys so its effectiveness has been greatly reduced.

Mr Thaksin has simultaneously turned his attention on the press with critical journalists being either sweetened or bullied into submission. The latter was done with threats to withhold advertising, two-thirds of which comes from state enterprises and a significant proportion of the rest from companies controlled by Thaksin or his cronies. Even resident foreign journalists were threatened with expulsion for printing mildly critical articles.

The anti-democratic warning bells have risen to a new crescendo in the past month, however. Mr Thaksin's inability to handle criticism reached a new nadir a fortnight ago after a senior member of the national human rights commission, Pradit Charoenthaithawee, raised concerns at a United Nations conference about more than 1,000 apparent extra-judicial killings in the war on drugs.

Rather than engaging Mr Pradit, Mr Thaksin set his pitbulls on him and said he did not have to worry about what the UN thought of his policies. As the outcry mounted, both internationally and domestically, the prime minister then refused to talk to the press on political matters - he now walks past journalists like a spoilt brat who hasn't got his way. One newspaper editorial recently encouraged Mr Thaksin to attend anger management classes and public sensitivity training.

But a much more worrying trend to emerge from the war on drugs is the seemingly complete disregard for the rule of law. No credible effort is being made to investigate the 1,500-plus murders of the past six weeks and it appears the former police colonel is giving officers a free rein. Critics have said the situation is worse than Afghanistan under the Taliban; at least the mullahs sent judges along to oversee executions and give a veneer of legitimacy to proceedings.

A recent survey exemplified the population's growing fears: 90% of respondents said harsh measures were needed to defeat the drugs menace but 70% said they feared being framed or worse by the police.

Kavi Chongkittavorn, a Thaksin critic and senior editor at the Nation newspaper, neatly put the prime minister into a global context. "He's a combination of the corporate dominance of [Italy's Silvio] Berlusconi, [Venezuela's Hugo] Chavez's populist approach and the thuggery of [Zimbabwe's Robert] Mugabe," he said.

It is unclear where this conflict between Mr Thaksin and the pro-democracy movement will end. The war on drugs is set to continue for months and the pressure on the media, human rights organisations and other potential critics continues to mount along the lines of George Bush's "If you're not with us, you're against us" philosophy. In the last few days Mr Thaksin has swapped his prime ministerial limousine for a bullet-proof minivan. He says he fears an attack from drug dealers. Cynics might suggest it's to protect him from the increasingly ferocious brickbats heading his way.

www.atimes.com By James A Russell

With the Bush administration intent on regime change in Baghdad, much attention in the press and in the policy community is understandably focused on the rights and wrongs of tactics of removing Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. But while the circumstances of Saddam's removal are being crafted and debated, the broader issue facing strategic planners is the task of reconstructing a regional security architecture that may be more relevant to the region's emerging requirements in a post-Saddam era. Just as the attacks of September 11, 2001, forced a break from the past and enabled new ways of thinking about how the United States should interact with the international community, the debate over the removal of Saddam provides the US with an opportunity to reexamine a host of assumptions that have driven US security strategy and policy in the region over the past decade. When the Berlin Wall came tumbling down in 1989 and the inauguration of the "post-Cold War" world was proclaimed, the forces of change that swept through various other parts of the globe did not materially affect the Persian Gulf. The presence of a defiant Saddam and the so-called "box" of containment constructed largely with American military power were major reasons why forces unleashed by the absence of the US-Soviet rivalry did not manifest themselves in the Gulf. But the prospect of a Gulf without Saddam could represent a "crumbling" of a Berlin Wall of sorts in the region and unleash a variety of pent-up forces for change that could profoundly affect regional security and stability. The dictates of prudent planning suggest that the US, the region and the international community start thinking about these issues now if we hope to see how a war with Iraq could be made into a positive force for long-term security. If the Gulf has been slow to see the forces of change flowing in the post-Cold War era, it is also true that US strategy in the Gulf has changed little during the past 20-odd years. American interests, strategy and policy have remained remarkably constant over the decades. Starting with formulations by senior policymakers dating to the 1940s, the US has always regarded unimpeded access to the oil of the region as a "vital" interest. While using force to protect this interest was by extension always an implicit assumption, it wasn't until president Jimmy Carter's January 1980 statements in the aftermath of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan that the commitment finally became public. Flowing from this commitment, the US subsequently deployed forces to the Gulf in the 1980s to protect oil tanker traffic and then fought the Gulf War after Saddam threatened to overrun the Arabian Peninsula in 1991. US strategy and policy in the region since then have operated on three assumptions:

1. The need for access to reasonably priced oil.
2. The need to ensure that no hostile force control the region and its oil supplies or so intimidate other states so as to coerce supplier states into taking actions inimical to consuming nations.
3. A commitment to use force if necessary to protect and further these interests. The US security architecture in the region is largely based on these key premises. The idea of a "security architecture" suggests a complex interrelationship between a host of political and military variables and a decision-making process that can coherently and systematically integrate them into a whole. In terms of defining the critical elements of the architecture, the US has over the decades:
4. Defined the US vital interests in the Gulf.
5. Developed a strategy to protect and further those interests.
6. Formulated policy to implement that strategy.
7. Committed the political and financial resources to operationalize this policy in the region. During the 1990s, the US did reasonably well following this logical process in establishing a security architecture that served its interests. In strictly military terms, that architecture had a number of main elements: forward deployed US forces engaged in ongoing operations, access to host nation facilities, prepositioned equipment, sales of defense equipment to promote the self-defense capabilities of American allies, and regional military engagement through exercises and training. (1) The issue facing the policy community today is whether this existing security structure will be relevant to the post-Saddam period and whether it will continue to protect and promote US interests and those of its allies. More...

english.pravda.ru 10:22 2003-03-13

According to conservationists, oil & gas mega-projects in the area could destroy world's largest rain forest system in a relatively short period of time

The Amazon Basin contains the world's largest tropical rainforest and houses nearly fifty percent of the planet's terrestrial biodiversity. Located in nine countries along South America, this mankind treasure is today at serious risk, as world's energy giants develop simultaneous infrastructure projects that threaten millions of hectares and the isolated indigenous cultures.

Mega-Projects are massive infrastructure projects - pipelines, power lines, roads, dams, and waterways-designed to open the Amazon rainforest frontier to large-scale industrial development. Mega-projects enable industries to extract and export raw materials (oil, gas, timber, gold, etc.) to regional and global markets.

Most of those projects require large-scale deforestation to go ahead and the economically weakened Andean countries cannot control the advance of the multinationals. In some cases, like Peru and Ecuador, the necessity of meeting extraordinary foreign debt payments make them surrender to global corporations and support their threatening investments.

One of the most notorious cases is the Camisea Project in southeastern Peru. Financed by public funded banks like the Export-Import bank of the U.S. and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Camisea is meant to export to the USA, 13 trillions cubic meters of gas. According to Amazon Watch, it has already taken the life of 15 Indians from the Nanti community, who died of diseases previously unknown in the area.

Camisea is pushed forward by an Argentine - US consortium headed by Pluspetrol (Arg) and the Hunt Oil Co., from Texas. Halliburton, another Texas based oil company, in which Dick Cheney served as CEO before joining George W. Bush administration, will construct the Pacific Ocean oil terminal to export the gas production to Peru to the Western ports of the United States. According to very well informed sources, Camisea would increase Peruvian GDP in a 15% once finished.

Amazon Watch says "the Camisea companies clearly care little about meeting international environmental standards as the project even violates minimal World Bank policies by destroying critical natural habitat, affecting endangered species, failing to assess and mitigate adequately environmental impacts and refusing to implement independent expert oversight or monitoring. As such, an April 2002 Independent Assessment of the project predicted irreparable impacts on the region."

Ecuador, another country in serious troubles to meet foreign debt obligations as Peru, also holds dangerous energy projects. Another consortium of multinational oil companies is driving ahead with a controversial new oil pipeline project known as OCP (heavy crude pipeline). The 300 miles pipeline to export heavy crude through country's Pacific ports, is expected to be finished by June 2003. Amazon Watch warns that this would place fragile ecosystems and dozens of communities in jeopardy.

Ecuador struggled hard during the year 2000 to seal an agreement with the International Monetary Fund. According with the independent media and sources in Ecuador, one of the IMF requirements at that time was to hike in oil production to meet payments on its US$16 billion national debt. Therefore, the Ecuadorian Government embarked on a massive oil exploitation program that endangers the central and southern Amazon rainforests.

The situation in Colombia is even more difficult. To the debt problems, the analyst has to add the long-running conflict between the authorities and the Marxist rebel groups operating along the country. To secure foreign investments, the Government usually militarizes oil regions and pipelines. Therefore, those areas turn into battlefields as oil wells and pipelines are juicy targets for guerrillas. For instance, an oil pipeline in the northern Department of Arauza has been blown up over 700 times.

Then, the paramilitary groups go to these areas to counterattack rebel actions, which leads to increased violations of the basic human rights of indigenous communities and cause the forced displacement of many from their ancestral homelands.

Bolivia is another paradigmatic case. The country went through a severe social crisis after neo-liberal policies were imposed to the impoverished population. Continuos rural uprisings that sometimes reach the largest cities, like the last popular rebellion that stormed La Paz, are the expression of the deep social instability the country is in.

However, its vast gas resources look very attractive to foreign investors. In the last four years, Bolivian gas reserves have leapt up to 52.3 trillion cubic feet from 5.6 trillion cubic feet. To export an estimated 75% of this gas, plans are underway to expand the gas pipeline system through the heart of Bolivia's globally renowned forests and indigenous territories. Again, oil giants like Brazil's Petrobras, in their fight to dominate the market, pass over the opposition from the farming communities that live in the path of gas development.

Brazil and Venezuela also have a part on this. In joint and individual projects, both countries put the fate of the Amazon basin into an uncertain future. Amazon Watch warns on the construction of a 470 mile long power line that would bring electricity from Venezuela to Brazil. According to this conservationist group, "the mega-project will have serious impacts on the health, the land and the way of life for more that 24.000 indigenous people".

Multinational interests, lobbying power and local indebted economies combine to threat a treasure that belongs to the entire humanity. The consequences of the destruction of the world's richest ecosystem are unpredictable. No question, the most affected will be the man himself.

Hernan Etchaleco PRAVDA.Ru Argentina

Based on reports from Amazon Watch, Amazon Alliance and National Geographic

www.malaysiakini.com 4:06pm Thu Mar 13th, 2003

LONDON — Latin America is suddenly teeming with Islamic terrorist organisations, according to a string of high-profile statements by US officials and legislators.

This on-again-off-again theme was revived last week by the chief of the US Southern Command, General James Hill, and taken up by the US ambassador to Venezuela, Charles Shapiro.

A variant, linking Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez with al Qaeda and Hamas, was floated by seven Republican lawmakers in a letter to US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

General Hill told participants in a conference organised by the University of Miami's North-South Center, on March 3, that the Middle Eastern communities in Latin America were sending 'hundreds of millions of dollars' to Islamic 'terror' organisations.