Russian oil companies are trying to secure new contracts with Baghdad in an attempt to dominate Iraq’s huge reserves and hold Washington to its promise of respecting Moscow’s economic interests in the event of a regime change. Zarubezhneft and Rosneft have announced that they were jointly preparing to sign a contract to develop the massive Nahr Umr oilfield in Iraq, which they said contains 3 billion tonnes of crude oil worth an estimated GBP 350 billion. Moscow is highly concerned that American oil firms will use the political vacuum of a Pentagon takeover of Baghdad to consider all contracts signed under the Saddam regime as invalid, and take control of the oilfields. But President Bush has sought to allay those fears by saying that the USA would respect Russia’s economic interests in Iraq.
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