Iraq’s Australian ambassador will meet Woodside Petroleum officials in Perth next week during his first official visit to Western Australia.
Iraq’s Australian ambassador will meet Woodside Petroleum officials in Perth next week during his first official visit to Western Australia.
A Woodside spokesman declined to say who Ambassador Ghanim Al-Shibli would be meeting or what would be on the agenda.
He told WA Business News the meeting was a routine courtesy visit from the most senior Australian representative of a country in which Woodside had an interest.
“It’s not something we set up,” the spokesman said.
The State Government’s protocol department and the Iraqi embassy in Canberra also declined to release details of the visit.
In late 2004, Woodside signed a two-year memorandum of co-operation with the Iraq Oil Ministry to evaluate potential oil and gas projects in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq.
A joint six-month study, mostly done from Perth to identify viable oil and gas projects in Iraq, was completed last year. Woodside has yet to take up any exploration ground there.
The company’s interest in Iraq made international headlines early last year when WA Liberal senator Ross Lightfoot was accused of smuggling $US20,000 into Iraq on Woodside’s behalf during a parliamentary study tour to the Kurdish region.
The claims were emphatically denied by Woodside and the senator, and no government or police action was taken.
Senator Lightfoot said he did attend a meeting in Iraq where a $US20,000 donation from the Woodside Hydrocarbon Research Facility in Perth was given to the Prime Minister of the Kurdish Regional Government but that this was done by a representative of Australian Kurds.
Woodside denied that Senator Lightfoot had traveled to Iraq to make the donation on behalf of the company and said it had no relationship with him.
The company said its donation was made through proper channels, was in keeping with its practice of donating to community projects in areas of interest and that the gift had been properly acknowledged by Kurdish authorities.
The US Energy Information Administration has estimated that Iraq has about 115 billion barrels of proven oil reserves and possibly much more in unexplored areas of the country, with only about 10 per cent of the country’s reserves explored.
Iraq is also estimated to contain at least 110 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Another international focus for Woodside is Africa, where it has been building an exploration and production portfolio in Kenya, Libya, Algeria, the Canary Islands, Mauritania, Sierra Leone and Liberia since 2000.
Mauritania’s offshore region became a new oil province with Woodside’s Chinguetti, Banda, Tiof and Tevet discoveries between 2001 and 2004, which have oil reserves of several hundred million barrels.
Such new regions are not without their sovereign risk problems, as Woodside found recently when the Mauritanian Government advised it was disputing amendments Woodside had made to four offshore production sharing contracts.
Woodside said the amendments were all approved by the government and passed into law last year but confirmed the two were in discussion.
The dispute comes after the reported detainment of Mauritania’s former energy minister over agreements signed with foreign companies. The former minister was part of the government overthrown in a political coup last August.
Woodside said it welcomed the government’s willingness to address the matter under the dispute resolution procedures of the production sharing contracts.
It is likely that, if the dispute cannot be resolved through discussion, the parties will go to arbitration under the contract terms. The dispute does not affect the Woodside operated Chinguetti offshore project, which remains on schedule to produce its first oil this month, with peak production of 75,000 barrels a day over a 10-year life.
Perth-based junior explorer, Baraka Petroleum, which has three production sharing contracts in Mauritania, is also involved in the dispute.
The company has confirmed that all agreements concerning its projects and contracts in Mauritania have been approved by the government and, where applicable, passed into law.
Baraka said that, earlier this month, the Mauritanian energy and petroleum minister called a meeting of the petroleum companies in Mauritania at which he reinforced his government’s on-going dedication to the development of the oil and gas industry in Mauritania.
Baraka has one of the largest oil and gas exploration assets in West Africa, with rights to develop eight tenement areas covering more than 272,000sqkm in Mauritania and Mali.
Libya holds Africa’s largest proven oil reserves, with 36 billion barrels and gas reserves of an estimated 46 trillion cubic feet. Woodside has significant onshore and offshore exploration acreage there.
In Algeria, which has proven oil reserves estimated at 11 billion barrels and gas reserves of 160 trillion cubic feet, Woodside has extensive onshore exploration and production interests. Algeria has the world’s seventh largest gas reserves.
The Iraqi ambassador is visiting WA from next Monday to Friday and is expected to have meetings with Premier Alan Carpenter, other state ministers, senior officials and businesses, as well as attend some private functions.
