Attacks on Iraq Oil Industry Aid Vast Smuggling Scheme

[Pale Blue Dot]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/04/world/middleeast/04smuggle.html?hp&ex=1149393600&en=b360712219ef1612&ei=5094&partner=homepage

The sabotage attacks that have crippled Iraq's oil pipelines and refineries for the past three years are now being used to aid a vast smuggling network that is costing the Iraqi government billions of dollars a year, senior Iraqi and American officials here say.

<snip>

In many cases documented by Mr. Alak and other Iraqi officials, truckers, often collaborating with smuggling gangs, pay bribes or use forged papers to cross Iraqi borders at will, tamper with their fuel meters to inflate the value of their load or simply turn their loads over to the gangs.

As a result, as much as 30 percent of imported gasoline is ending up in the hands of smugglers, who promptly resell the gasoline abroad, according to American and Iraqi officials. The shortfall is part of what forces Iraqi families to spend more on fuel from the black market, where it is far more expensive than from legal outlets.

<snip>

The network is so pervasive and entrenched, the officials say, that fuel importers brazenly arrive at depots with half-empty tankers and arrange to have their deliveries certified as complete. It is also lucrative for the smallest of businesses. Bakers, brickmakers and even fishing boat operators find it more profitable to sell fuel, which they receive at subsidized prices, to illicit traders rather than operate their businesses.

[ShockediSay]

1. Every bit as ethical as America's Enrons, WorldComs

NeoCons and all the other corporofascists (did I forget the rest of the crooks in Congress and their lobbyist bagmen?)

[rodeodance]

3. yes, the cheating just takes other forms.

[pooja]

2. How does this inflate Haliburton's profit?

I smell a skunk

[Joanne98]

4. Under Saddam gas was 25 cents a gallon.

[bemildred]

5. Goodness me, corruption in Iraq? nt

[Skink]

6. The Bush administration in a nutshell.

[UpInArms]

7. American and British overseers look the other way

Borders are porous, roads are unsafe, officials at state-run oil companies are accused of being in league with insurgents and Iraq's oil wealth is carried out of the country in ships and tanker trucks as American and British overseers look the other way, the Iraqi and American officials say.

how handy :sarcasm: