September 28, 2010 6:28 AM
While its competitors bowed to international pressure against trade with Iran, the U.K.-registered oil giant Shell increased its purchase of crude from the isolated regime over the summer, according to a report in Tuesday’s Guardian.
The British broadsheet says it obtained confidential documents revealing that Shell paid Iran at least $1.5 billion for crude oil in the summer months alone, as competitors including BP halted orders from the Islamic Republic.
Iran is under strict economic and military embargoes implemented by the United Nations Security Council and many countries unilaterally, including, of course, the United States.
Shell’s only response to the Guardian’s report was to insist that the purchase of Iranian crude in no way violates any sanctions.
The importation of oil from Iran has not been banned by the sanctions currently in place, but most large petroleum companies have voluntarily stopped purchasing from the nation.
Any money paid to Iran for crude goes to the state-owned oil company, and in turn to help fund the government. Run by Islamic clerics and hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Islamic government has made the development of its nuclear power program a cornerstone policy.
The U.S. government and many of its allies insist the energy program is hiding a clandestine effort by the Iranians to develop nuclear weapons capability – a charge the country’s leaders flatly deny.
British foreign secretary William Hague said recently that the U.K. does not encourage trade with Iran due to “serious concerns about the nature of Iran’s nuclear program,” reports the Guardian.
Asked to comment on the story Monday night, a spokesman for Hague’s office told the newspaper that the government was, “serious about intensifying the pressure on Iran to return to the negotiating table.”
RELATED LONDON EVENING STANDARD ARTICLE:
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.
