|
A tale of oil smugglers in Kirkuk: Big business, black markets,
bribery |
|
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the
content of news information on this page |
|
A tale of oil smugglers in Kirkuk: Big
business, black markets, bribery
20.7.2012
By Shalaw Mohammed, Kirkuk - Niqash |
|
|
|
July 20, 2012
KIRKUK, Iraq's border with Kurdistan region,
— Oil smuggling is virtually a tradition in the
oil-producing areas of Iraq. And local authorities
are trying to prevent it. But, as this tale of oil
smuggling in Kirkuk shows, policing the smuggling
gangs remains extremely difficult – not to mention
confusing.
The epic tale of an oil smuggling gang in Kirkuk is
nearly two years old now. The gang was making an
estimated US$60,000 a day from their activities. And
they were caught in the act over 24 months ago – yet
they are, allegedly, all still free. As one member
of the security forces says: “no one can arrest
them”.
The story is not an uncommon one in Iraq, where oil
smuggling has a long history and where authorities
appear loathe to take responsibility for policing
this particular crime. Most tales of oil smugglers
see various authorities – from the judiciary to the
police to the state to the local oil companies
themselves – saying it’s the other group’s
responsibility to secure the oil.
Oil smuggling became a growth industry when former
Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein organized gangs to start
smuggling oil to get around international sanctions
against Iraq. Tankers would siphon oil from various
sources and either sell them on the home market or
on the black market in nearby nations; demand was
there for oil to run home generators, for example,
needed because of electricity cuts. And despite the
best efforts to halt the practice, it has continued
in various forms to this day.
An anonymous source tells Niqash that this
particular instance of oil smuggling began when
Iraq’s own North Oil Company decided to build a
pipeline from the Jabal Bur oil processing station
to a nearby area, Kiwan, where the pipe could then
connect to a larger network.
Local contractors were signed on to build the
pipeline and while they were building it, they
decided to make a hole in the pipe in order to
siphon off oil and smuggle it away in waiting trucks
or ships. As the oil passed through the Rahimawa
quarter in Kirkuk the contractors added a special
pipe of their own to siphon oil off. To cover up
their activities, they built a huge auto garage.
Experts in the field say that putting a hole in an
oil pipeline is far from a simple task and they
believe that the smugglers must have had to bring in
experts from outside of the province to do this.
“A person with no experience in piercing an oil
pipeline cannot extract oil from it,” local oil and
gas consultant, Shlair Hamid, said.
“Anyone who wants to pierce a pipeline also needs to
have special equipment to do that. Otherwise there
could be a fire. All the evidence suggests that
someone from outside Iraq was brought here to do
this job.”
After holing the pipeline, they made a secret deal
with one of North Oil’s engineers. In return for a
percentage of the profits, the engineer agreed to
record less oil flowing through the pipeline than
there actually was. Niqash’s source says that the
oil smugglers were selling around US$60,000 worth of
oil every day, of which the duplicitous engineer was
getting about US$10,000.
The oil smuggling circuit was only uncovered after
the engineer began to ask for more money. After the
other gang members refused him, he went to the
police. This resulted in a committee of
investigators from Baghdad travelling to Kirkuk to
look into the accusations. In the end, local police
were able to arrest one of the pipeline contractors
involved. However political pressure and bribes saw
the contractor released. Now, according to Niqash’s
source, the whole oil smuggling gang remains at
liberty.
However Kirkuk authorities deny this version of
events. “This is not the first time that gangs have
stolen Kirkuk’s oil,” the head of Kirkuk’s local
council, Hassan Turan, says. “There are well
organized groups stealing the oil and it is the duty
of North Oil Company to protect their oil pipelines
against theft.”
Turan also said that several of the oil smugglers
involved have been arrested and that local courts
are now handling the case.
However, strangely, Turan’s statement contradicts
those from other authorities. “We received
information that a gang had made a hole in the
pipeline in Rahimawa and was stealing oil from this
hole,” Ghalib Taha,www.ekurd.net
one of the heads of the Rahimawa police station,
says. “By the time the police had arrived at the
garage the gang members had gone. We arrested the
garage guard but we realised him because he didn’t
know anything about the pipeline.”
Taha says that, while the police and even the
citizens of Kirkuk, knew about the smugglers, the
local council seemed reluctant to move against them.
And because of this, Taha says, “we are not entitled
to take any measures.”
Meanwhile the deputy chairperson of the Kirkuk
council had an explanation for this. “The Ministry
of Oil notified us in writing that we should not
interfere in the work of oil institutions and that
we should not interfere in any related issue or
case,” Ribwar al-Talabani told Niqash.
“This is why we didn’t conduct any investigations
into this matter.”
Al-Talabani also brought up the dubious history of
oil smuggling in Iraq. “In the past, each hole made
in a pipeline was dedicated to a tribal leader - or
to a political party,” he explains. “Everywhere else
in the world, oil pipelines are well protected. But
in Iraq, it’s a mess and nobody knows who exactly is
stealing the oil.”
This has been well documented by many sources.
Tribal leaders have been seen to obstruct measures
to protect the oil pipelines and one tribe,
contracted to provide security for the oil
pipelines, even used that contract to cover up their
smuggling activities. As a result, nobody seems
particularly keen to do anything about bringing
smugglers to justice.
Article 111 of the Iraqi Constitution states that
“oil and gas are owned by all the people of Iraq in
all the regions and governorates” and one might
assume that it was the responsibility of each
provincial authority to protect the resources within
their area.
But, as al-Talabani says, “we haven’t received any
instructions from the central government to
investigate such cases. That’s why oil smuggling has
become commonplace in almost all oil producing
provinces.”
Meanwhile officials from the North Oil Company, a
state-run company within Iraq’s Ministry of Oil,
deny the whole story. “I have never heard about this
gang you’re talking about,” Hamid al-Saedi, the
general manager of North Oil, said in a brief
statement.
All of which makes it difficult to know what is
really going on with the oil smuggling gangs in
Kirkuk. Then again this seems fairly typical for the
oil smuggling in Iraq: there’s simply too much money
involved for it to be easily eradicated.
Nonetheless Iraqi officials continue to insist it
must be. Finally, the governor of Kirkuk, Najm
al-Din Karim, told Niqash that all local security
apparatuses must intensify their efforts to police
oil smuggling. “Anyone considering oil smuggling in
Kirkuk will be punished,” Karim stated firmly.
Copyright ©, respective
author or news agency,
niqash.org
Top |
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the
content of news information on this page
|
|
|
®
