Expatica: Shell, Total tight-lipped over merger rumour
16 August 2004
AMSTERDAM — Royal Dutch/Shell has declined to be drawn into rumours the Anglo-Dutch oil giant faced a potential takeover bid from French rival Total.
Total has also declined to comment on the report in British Sunday newspaper the Observer.
Without quoting sources, the paper said Shell insiders fear Total will launch a raid and force a merger, and that the takeover was the subject of “fevered speculation”.
“Total, the world’s fourth-largest oil firm, is considered the only predator capable of gaining regulatory approval for what would be a spectacular merger,” the paper said.
Royal Dutch/Shell is the third-largest oil group in the world and has two boards because the Amsterdam-based Royal Dutch owns 60 percent of the group and the British-run Shell owns the other 40 percent.
The company has controversially had to downgrade its known reserves of oil and gas by 23 percent in four separate revisions this year. The scandal led to the resignation of three top executives, including former chairman Sir Philip Watts.
Last week, the company said it would merge its Dutch and British supervisory boards and was also considering merging its two holding companies, Royal Dutch and Shell.
[Copyright Expatica News 2004]
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
