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April 19, 2011

Exposed: Link Between British Oil Firms and Invasion of Iraq 
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The Independent newspaper of London has revealed Britain discussed plans
to exploit Iraq's oil reserves with some of the world's biggest oil
companies five months before it joined the United States in invading the
country in 2003. Citing previously secret documents, the newspaper said
at least five meetings were held between British officials and BP and
Royal Dutch Shell in late 2002. BP privately told the British Foreign
Office at the time that Iraq was "more important than anything we've
seen for a long time." The documents were obtained by the oil campaigner
Greg Muttitt, author of the new book, Fuel on the Fire: Oil and Politics
in Occupied Iraq.

Greg Muttitt: “Tony Blair famously said in early 2003, ‘the idea
that we’re interested in Iraq’s oil is absured, it’s one of the
most abusrd conspiracy theories you can imagine’, if you remember. And
at the same time that he was saying that an internal document, a secret
document in the foreign office which set out British strategy towards
Iraqi oil and it said, "'Britain has an absolutely vital interest in
Iraq’s oil.'"



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