Tue Apr 17, 2007 12:20 PM BST
MOSCOW, April 17 (Reuters) – Only red tape is preventing Russia’s gas monopoly Gazprom and Royal Dutch Shell from completing their $7.45 billion Sakhalin-2 deal, which is virtually sealed, industry sources said on Tuesday.
“There are no outstanding issues between the parties but the deal has to follow certain procedural steps for completion,” said one industry source close to the deal.
The two firms and Shell’s two Japanese partners struck a preliminary deal in December for Gazprom to take a 50 percent stake in the huge energy project and hoped to complete the details in the first quarter of this year.
But the final talks, which industry sources had said would conclude on Monday with no material changes to the agreement reached in December, dragged on through Tuesday.
One source said the final agreement had been sent to the office of Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov before getting bogged down in procedural questions.
Under the deal Gazprom will pay cash to Shell and its Japanese partners Mitsui and Mitsubishi, becoming the leader of the project.
The deal followed months of pressure on the project by Russian environmental authorities and was interpreted by analysts as yet another step in the Kremlin’s drive to win more control over Russia’s huge energy industry.
Shell and its Japanese partners will each dilute their stakes by half, leaving them with 27.5 percent, 12.5 percent and 10 percent, respectively.
© Reuters 2007. All rights reserved.
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.
