Iraq allocates 7m barrels of crude for Indonesia
Tuesday, July 25 2000 - 02:30 AM WIB
Iraq has allocated only 7 million barrels of crude oil, out of the agreed 20 million barrels that would be exported to Indonesia under the UN-sponsored oil for food program, according to Indonesian Minister of Industry and Trade Luhut B. Panjaitan.
Luhut said that the number 20 million barrels of crude was given by the Iraqi government, and therefore he was confident that the amount would be eventually increased to 20 million from 7 million barrels of crude now.
Iraq has also appointed only three Indonesian oil-trading companies, out of 10 companies presented by the Indonesian government
"Petro Oil gets 3 million barrels of crude to import, while the other two companies get the remaining 4 million barrels," Luhut said. But he refused to name the two companies. When pressed if Golden Spike Energy Indonesia Ltd., that belongs to former Army Special Force commander Prabowo Subianto, was one of the two companies, Luhut said Golden Spike was not one of them.
He added that the other seven trading companies presented by the government to Iraq, including Golden Spike, were still required to meet two requirements to participate in the importation of Iraqi crude.
The two requirements were that the trading companies must have contracts with the buyers of the crude, and present a bank guarantee with value equivalent with one million barrels of crude or US$25 million.
"If they cannot meet the two requirements, they will be dropped," he said.
Besides Petro Oil and Golden Spike, the other eight trading companies are PT Concord Perdana Indonesia, PT Gemilang Energindo Sentosa, PT Sri Mukti Gas Corporation, PT Utama Bressindi Persada, PT Istana Karang Laut, PT Accia Nusantara, PT Ramada Agung Internasional, and Swadaya Sarana Berlian. (*)