Former Iraq oil minister hopeful for Basra

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Sept. 4 (UPI) -- A former Iraqi oil minister says political parties will resolve the sometimes violent power struggle in Basra as British troops pull back to the airport.

“There’s a struggle for power everywhere,” Ibrahim Bahrul-Uloom said on the sidelines of an Iraqi oil conference.

“Basra’s very important, the richest city in the world as far as the reserves are concerned because Basra, only as a province, has 68 billion barrels of oil,” he said. “But I think whatever we have seen right now from tension between the political side can be solved within the next few months.”

Bahrul-Uloom, oil minister from September 2003 to June 2004 and May 2005 to December 2005, spoke at the Iraq Oil, Gas, Petrochemical and Electricity Summit, organized by the London-based Iraq Development Program.

Basra is the oil capital of Iraq, where most of the country’s 115 billion barrels of proven reserves are located and nearly all its 1.7 million barrels per day of exports are sent to market.

It has seen upheaval as regional and national political and militia groups angle for control of the province and the lucrative black market for fuels and oil.

British troops have been the only Multi-National Force presence in Basra, and the country withdrew its remaining 500 troops from the city to the base at the airport.

Political parties in Basra, which also have power in the federal government, dispute control but have left fighting to their militias and rival gangs to be carried on in the streets. There is a fear that a surge in violence could spread far enough to negatively affect the oil sector.

Bahrul-Uloom said calming Basra depends on how politics in both Baghdad and Basra pan out, but he’s hopeful.

“Now we’ll see signs that things have slightly moved,” he said, adding it won’t be fixed “within a day or night” but rather will trickle down “from the center.”

“A very difficult situation but part of the political change, environment and there are some mistakes that have been done in Iraq. Some of them coming from the previous regime. Some of them committed by us. Some of them committed by Americans. It’s a cumulative process.”

He said the biggest mistake was appointing key government positions based on party affiliation and not expertise.

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Ben Lando, UPI Energy Editor