By MICHAEL CONNOLLY
September 19, 2006
Moscow’s cancellation Monday of an environmental permit for the $20 billion oil-and-gas project led by Royal Dutch Shell PLC on the island of Sakhalin raises questions about how far the standoff between Russia and the international oil majors might escalate. It seems about as defensible as the country’s seizure and destruction of thousands of Motorola cellphones in March.
The move looks like a negotiating tactic aimed at restructuring terms of the Sakhalin-2 project agreement — signed during the 1990s, when oil prices were lower — showing the Kremlin’s resolve to regain control of oil-and-gas projects amid higher energy prices. Shell and Sakhalin Energy Ltd., the project’s operator — in which Shell holds a 55% and Japan’s Mitsui & Co. and Mitsubishi Corp. are also shareholders — say there isn’t any legitimate basis for canceling the permit.
Sakhalin-2 is the only major oil-and-gas project in Russia in which a Russian company doesn’t have a stake, although Shell is in talks with OAO Gazprom on swapping part of Sakhalin Energy for a stake in another gas field in Russia called Zapolyarnoye. Russia’s natural resources minister, Yuri Trutnev, said last week that enhanced environmental scrutiny of Sakhalin Energy is part of Russia’s efforts “to defend its interests” after Shell said the cost of the project would nearly double to $20 billion, meaning Russia would have to wait longer to see its share in the profits.
Read our article on Sakhalin:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115862910114267082.html
Read Breakingviews’ take:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115861393756466626.html
Read Russell Gold’s article on the likelihood that the successful production of oil from the five-mile-deep Jack well in the Gulf of Mexico will spur more deep-water exploration around the world, helping calm overheated crude-oil markets:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115863558352767214.html
Read Chip Cummins’ article on BP postponing the start-up of its long-delayed Thunder Horse oil field in the Gulf of Mexico, making long-term production goals harder to achieve:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115859921593866419.html
Read an article on Norwegian energy company Statoil’s agreeing to acquire rights to Gulf of Mexico deep-water projects:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115857610070366172.html
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: 
MORE DETAILS:
A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
