After corporate warfare, real war.
Energy
The Bear’s market
The Battle for Oil: EUs hope to bypass Russian energy may be a pipe dream
The Battle for Oil: EUs hope to bypass Russian energy may be a pipe dream
By Claire Soares
Tuesday, 12 August 2008
Georgia may have no natural resources to speak of, yet it has become a key player for Europe, due to 155 miles of pipeline that snake across its territory.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline is the only practical route for carrying Caspian oil to Western markets that avoids Russia a treasured asset for the a European Union trying to reduce energy dependence on Moscow.
The BTC, which connects Baku in Azerbaijan, via the Georgian capital Tbilisi with Ceyhan, a port on the south-eastern Mediterranean coast of Turkey, was once billed as the “pipeline of peace”. Now it finds itself on the fringes of war zone as Russian and Georgia face off.
Russian law curbs foreign investment in key sectors
In one of his last acts as Russian president, Vladimir Putin yesterday signed a long-awaited law restricting foreign investment in 42 "strategic" sectors, including energy, telecoms, mining and aerospace.