Devon cited in Riggs Bank case

[seemslikeadream]

Devon Energy became involved in Equatorial Guinea through its acquisition of Ocean Energy of Houston.

Devon Energy paid $350,000 into Riggs accounts for students from Equatorial Guinea enrolled in training programs or universities abroad, according to the Senate investigators' report. They found that all the oil companies in question made similar payments for students, sometimes as a condition to participate in oil production sharing agreements in Equatorial Guinea. Many or possibly all the students were the children or other relatives of government officals, but it is unclear to what extent the oil companies were aware of the students' status, the report said.

http://www.newsok.com/article/1289666/?template=business/main

[bobthedrummer]

1. Marathon Oil has been cited for bribes in Equatorial Guinea too,

seemslikeadream. I used to go to one of the Marathon stations for gas, but no longer.

[seemslikeadream]

2. The New Gulf Oil States

January 8, 2003
The United States used to attach little importance to Africa, but now it is reviewing its oil sources strategy and sub-Saharan Africa, with its good quality reserves, could account for 25% of all US crude oil imports by 2015.


The Gulf of Guinea, with estimated reserves of 24bn barrels, is likely to become the world's leading deep water offshore production centre. Except for the Sudanese oilfields, Africa's reserves are just opposite the east coast of the US. The Chad-Cameroon pipeline will carry a further 250,000 barrels a day to the Atlantic. US oil companies - the two giants Exxon-Mobil and Chevron-Texaco, and operators such as Amerada Hess, Marathon and Ocean Energy - will invest more than $10bn in African oil this year.

The area became a geopolitical priority before 11 September 2001. At a meeting in 2000 on Africa's energy potential, oil companies told the Congress sub-committee on Africa just that. The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies (IASPS), a think-tank set up in Jerusalem in 1984, played an important part in the meeting. IASPS has close links with the Likud party, a longstanding advocate of reducing dependence on Saudi oil, and US neo-conservative forces.

Victory for the Texan oil lobby

Bush's electoral success was also a victory for the Texan oil lobby. In the aftermath of the September attacks IASPS' ideas gained ground with the administration's energy advisers and with White House falcons. In January 2002 IASPS organised a symposium attended by Kansteiner and members of the Bush administration (including Barry Schutz, a specialist on Africa, and Lt-Col Karen Kwiatkowksi, an airforce officer seconded to the defence secretary). The symposium was also attended by members of Congress, following the lead of William Jefferson, representative for Louisiana, by international consultants, and senior executives from oil firms and investment funds. The meeting marked the start of the African oil policy initiative group (AOPset up to interface between private and public sectors. It produced a paper "African oil, a priority for US national security and African development ". The oil industry's message to the administration was clear - you lead, we'll follow.

Since the symposium US energy policy has shown signs of being influenced by this lobby. The national policy made public in May by the vice-president, Richard Cheney, was eloquent: "African oil tends to be of high quality and low in sulphur giving it a growing market share for refining centres on the east coast of the US". AOPIG has also intervened in Nigeria, the north of which suffers political and social unrest, dispatching oil evangelist Michael Wihbey to Lagos in July. Officially the aim was to set up a Gulf of Guinea commission representing oil producing countries in the area. Unofficially there was talk of Nigeria leaving Opec, a rumour finally denied by the government.

The AOPIG paper recommends that the US should "not repeat the mistakes of the Persian Gulf". It should attach greater importance to transparency in the declaration of oil revenues and extend customs facilities already available to African countries. It should make a cautious commitment on debt cancellation. Much would have to change for US policy to adopt good intentions. Oil and good governance are currently a contradiction. In a document published in July, the association of episcopal conferences of the Central African region stressed that: "Complicity has come into play between our political power holders and oil companies. Revenue drawn from oil exploitation strengthens state authority, which is used to the detriment of the population".
more
http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:dNsozv-aIu0J:www.globalpolicy.org/security/natres/oil/2003/0114angola.htm+%22ocean+energy%22+george+bush&hl=en

:hi:bob
Lt-Col Karen Kwiatkowksi, now where have I heard that name before?

[seemslikeadream]

3. Devon Energy merges with Ocean Energy

March 2, 2003

Devon Energy and Ocean Energy have agreed to merge, and the new company, known as Devon Energy Corp., will be headquartered in Oklahoma City.

That will make Devon the largest U.S.-based independent oil and natural gas producer.

Most of the 90 people who work for Devon’s Central Texas Gulf Coast Region are based in the Brazos Valley.

The transaction is subject to approval by the shareholders of both companies and the expiration of the mandatory waiting period and other customary closing conditions.

J. Larry Nichols will remain as chairman and chief executive officer of Devon and James T. Hackett, who is currently chairman, president and CEO of Ocean, will be named president and chief operating officer.
http://www.theeagle.com/businesstechnology/strictlybusiness/030203strictlybusiness.htm

U.S. Oil Politics in the 'Kuwait of Africa'


It helps that the companies active in Equatorial Guinea have close ties to the Bush Administration. In addition to political heavyweights like ExxonMobil and Chevron, those firms include CMS Energy (which recently sold its holdings in Equatorial Guinea to Marathon). CMS's CEO, William McCormick, gave $100,000 to the Bush-Cheney 2001 Presidential Inaugural Committee. Ocean Energy's consultant on its Malabo operations is Chester Norris, a former ambassador to Equatorial Guinea under George Bush Sr. Perhaps best connected of all is Triton, whose chairman, Tom Hicks, made Bush a millionaire fifteen times over when he bought the Texas Rangers in 1998. Hicks's leveraged buyout firm, Hicks Muse, is Bush's fourth-largest career financial patron, according to the Center for Public Integrity.

Bush's decision to reopen the US Embassy was taken soon after he received a plea to do so from the oil industry. "It is important to underscore that most of the oil and gas concessions awarded in Equatorial Guinea to date, have been awarded to US firms," said a memo drafted on behalf of the oil companies and sent to Bush last year. "This is in stark contrast to neighboring countries in the region, where the United States has consistently lost out to French and other European and Asian competitors." Sisinio Mbana, first secretary at Equatorial Guinea's embassy in Washington, told me that at least four Bush Administration officials have consulted with Guinean leaders, including two from the State Department who have met discreetly with Obiang. "The oil companies have done a lot for us," Mbana said. "The State Department gets its information about Equatorial Guinea from them."
http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:T4fu-qp_LGwJ:www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi%3D20020422%26c%3D4%26s%3Dsilverstein+%22ocean+energy%22+george+bush&hl=en

[Snazzy]

4. That Nation article is great

Missed that, would have saved some google time.

Triton is hugely Bushco as is Amerada Hess.

Well, I suppose all US oil co's are Bushco., but some more than others.

Looks like The Nation has most of the info I had here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=728495#732025

Nation uncached link: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020422&c=1&s=silverstein

One thing I found out today is that John Snow, Tres. Sec., was on the Board of Marathon/US Steel giving us not only more Bushco., but a regional link to Pennsylvania, home of PNC, Rigg's buyer.

PNC stands for Pittsburgh National Corporation, the holding company for a number of old banks (Pittsburgh National Bank) and their late 80's expansion into other parts of the NE/Ohio. Maybe searching on the older names will show some more connections. Old money.

(It is not owned by the company Pallas (though well intentioned) mentions in the now archived thread, it owns them. Meant to respond to that.)

[Snazzy]

6. Snow to BFEE via "Pug" Winokur

You were getting close to that, Dream, in one of the earlier threads.

The railroad thing ties "Pug" to Snow. Some Enron, and Shrub bailouts. We're getting to real BFEE money people as you start to look at Oil co.'s here.

Good articles on this site:

http://www.newsmakingnews.com/catharvardpugdd.htm
http://www.newsmakingnews.com/catharvardmain.htm

[Snazzy]

19. PNC Bank and Marathon Oil

The Pittsburgh connection.

Via: Thomas J Usher
Chair, US Steel

US Steel and Marathon used to be same company.

Usher serves on board of both Marathon and PNC.

Marathon depositing bribes in Riggs, PNC bailing out/acquiring Riggs. All in the family.

Forbes Most Powerful People:

http://www.forbes.com/finance/mktguideapps/personinfo/FromPersonIdPersonTearsheet.jhtml?passedPersonId=218743

------

He served on those boards, USX and Marathon, with Tres. Sec. John Snow, the guy ultimately responsible for investigating/regulating lots of this, the oil co.'s, Riggs, the buy out. A quick buyout, had it not been for Senate investigations (and whatever is up with the Saudi DOJ thing), might have been enough to close out Treasury's FinCEN and OCC actions. Maybe the SEC wouldn't have become involved w/ oil companies. (Didn't work, this is getting massive).

(There's some cross-over with Hess too, via, of all companies, HJ Heinz and Edith E Holiday, Poppy's Assistant).

The Marathon thread here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=728495

[seemslikeadream]

20. A quick buyout

Damn you senators, always snooping around.

:toast:

[Snazzy]

21. Snow and Carlyle

Six days after Snow appointed by Shrub (Dec. 02, Carlyle buys a relatively worthless division of of Snow's former co., CSX, for a high price. The container division, rusting shipping containers/ships basically, was sold off by Carlyle recently (May).

Snow meanwhile had a huge golden parachute from CSX, with a main escape clause being huge compensation if he leaves the company for gov. service.

Snow became Tres. Sec. sometime during the Saudi portion of Riggs investigations (which we still don't really know much about, aside from say Newsweek reporting the checks to the San Diego terrorists).

While at CSX (1990), Snow also sold off all the company's oil and gas assets to ... wait for it ... Enron.

http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=14256
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/12.20D.carlyle.csx.htm
http://www.csx.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=history.chronology

[seemslikeadream]

22. Work which was meant to provoke UNEASE

A 'soft watch', a body tearing itself apart, Salvador Dali



"these are hand-painted dream photographs".

"agressive principle of subjectively distorted visions and the cultivation of delusional thought patterns".

"I believe that the moment is near when by a procedure of PARANOID THOUGHT it will be possible to bring about a total confusion and discrediting of the world of reality".

Dali sought to explode the comfortable perceptions of those who look at paintings. With an understanding of modern psychology, Dali produced work which was meant to provoke UNEASE.

[leesa]

5. What about Jonathan Bush? Have they mentioned his name yet?

[Snazzy]

7. Pravada mentioned it a couple of weeks ago.

WaPo did on biz page2 in May sometime. That's it. Riggs Saudi money ended up in the pockets of 9/11 San Diego hijackers too. That doesn't get mentioned either. In fact, the Levin's report specifically avoided covering either of these parts of the stories. Their investigation was designed to not look into any of that.

http://govt-aff.senate.gov/index.cfm?Fuseaction=Hearings.Detail&HearingID=189

Possibly there is a Grand Jury on that. Far as I know, we don't know.

Edit: 5/15 WaPo story based on blog:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28396-2004May14.html

Pravada, 7/20:

http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/91/368/13453_riggsbank.html

Oh, and The Spoof:

http://www.thespoof.com/news/spoof.cfm?headline=s2i5943
http://www.thespoof.com/news/spoof.cfm?headline=s2i5826

That's it, 'cept for us and blogs.

[seemslikeadream]

8. Snazzy do you know if Jonny boy's name came up

during the hearings?

Transcripts from Senate hearings take 3 months to be posted.

[Snazzy]

9. No, I still haven't done the RealPlayer thing

His name definitely came up in the OCC fine. Nobody reported it that I'm aware of. It is a 'complicated' banking angle, but actually one of the main reasons Riggs got in trouble had nothing to do with money laundering. It was the fact that acquired J Bush & Co, and had their own similar division, while acting as a certain kind of banker to foreigners (via Florida location). OCC didn't like that.

Oddly, Norm Coleman, the Majority repub on the Senate Investigations Perm. Subcommittee was the only one to mention the Saudi's at the hearings, at least according to press reports.

I'll suffer through Realplayer soon.

[Snazzy]

10. Watched most of it

Up to the oil companies. Only dozed off briefly (missed the Riggs guy taking the fifth, which must have been the best part. Levin talking about suitcases full of cash briefly, however, was compelling TV as hearings go. Still, I'd rather watch the House of Commons talk about auto-erotic asphyxiation anyday....)

No Uncle BFEE.

Anytime somebody starts to talk about details of the Saudi stuff, they stop themselves. "Can't discuss that." Levin: "not appropriate to discuss that document."

There's some sort of legal gag about the Saudi stuff--which could be a good sign, although I thought Congress could do what it pleases with respect to an ongoing DOJ investigation. Something up with that.

Correcting my early point about Jonathan Whistleass--there were two (maybe three) separate actions against Riggs in May.

The one from the Federal Reserve relates to J Bush and co.

Here's the consent decree:

http://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/press/enforcement/2004/20040514/default.htm

Riggs agreed to give up it's international banking subsidiary RIBC in Miami.

Somewhere there's more documents that explain how adding J Bush & co. and their own brokerage div., violated the conditions for being an Edge Act bank. I read those original docs, maybe the Fed's complaint, way back.

But the actual fine was for the money laundering and other related greed, not J Bush & co. as I thought earlier.

[seemslikeadream]

11. You're a champ

I'll try and watch tomorrow. Did you see the banks going under in Zimbabwe?

[Snazzy]

12. Not yet--will check it out

Did see Republic of Congo says it will no longer sell diamonds because they are all smuggled.

Levin also rips into one of the Riggs execs for not having a conscience with Obiang. Reads their kiss-ass letter to them while sneering. A good guy.


Edit: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040805/D8498OGG1.html

Republic of Congo Ends Diamond Exports


Email this Story

Aug 5, 3:36 PM (ET)

By LOUIS OKAMBA

BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) - The Republic of Congo said Thursday it would stop exporting diamonds after a U.N.-backed oversight group suspended the west African nation for allegedly smuggling millions of dollars worth of gems.

Nations in the Kimberley Process - created in 2002 to stanch the flow of so-called "blood diamonds" from conflict zones - expelled Republic of Congo from legitimate diamond markets July 9, accusing it of exporting smuggled gems to global trading centers.

...

In many African crisis zones - including Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola and this nation's larger neighbor, Congo - warring parties funded their fights by extracting and exporting diamonds.

....

[Snazzy]

13. Also interesting: U.S. Returns Embezzled Peruvian Funds

U.S. Returns Embezzled Peruvian Funds


Email this Story

Aug 6, 10:30 PM (ET)


LIMA, Peru (AP) - U.S. officials on Friday returned $20 million in embezzled Peruvian government funds that had been deposited in American banks under the direction of fallen spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos.

Peruvian Prime Minister Carlos Ferrero said the money had been deposited in American banks by two men working for Montesinos, now imprisoned in Lima and facing dozens of charges ranging from corruption to murder for authorizing anti-terror death squads.

He said that prosecutors believe that some $1 billion was skimmed from state coffers and squirreled away in foreign banks during Montesinos' tenure atop Peru's now-defunct National Intelligence Service.

... snip only 1 more p

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040807/D84A3TJ02.html

Makes you wonder which banks they don't name.

[seemslikeadream]

14. Here's a bit of the transcript

Embarrassed US Congress pressed to tighten anti-corruption laws in wake of oil scandal


At a hearing on the matter at which current and former bank officials appeared last week, Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat, was clearly outraged. "Somehow there has to be a conscience here. Aren't you troubled?," he said.

The report describes one incident in which the bank manager of the country's accounts, Simon Kareri, brought a 27 kilogram suitcase full of cash into Riggs to make a deposit into President Obiang's account.

Mr. Kareri, who was fired in January, refused to testify at last week's hearing," he said. "Mr. Chairman, there is nothing I would like to do more than answer your questions today. However, I must heed the advice of my counsel and invoke my fifth amendment rights under the Constitution and refuse to answer the question," he said.

Senators were angered that bank officials never reported any suspicious financial transactions involving Equatorial Guinea.

Lawrence Hebert, president and chief executive officer of Riggs Bank, blamed a lack of an internal system to monitor and identify such suspicious activity. It is an assertion that Senator Levin found ridiculous.

"First of all Mr. Hebert, you do not need a computer system to realize suspicious activity when you have sixty pounds of cash that are being walked into the door with a suitcase," he said.

Mr. Levin criticized bank regulators for not doing enough in their oversight responsibility.


Senator Levin also took aim at oil companies that are doing business in Equatorial Guinea, many of which have secret contracts with firms that have ties to President Obiang. The senator did not mince words in his questions to oil executives who appeared before his panel.

"Does it trouble you that you have a business partner like this dictator?," he asked.


more
http://www.progress.org/2004/oil13.htm

[emad]

16. Spoof treads fearlessly in the face of internet libel lawyers.....

"General Pinochet's personal references had been supplied by former President George Bush Senior whose glowing written assessment described him as a "notorious military leader accused of involvement with death squads, corruption, arms sales and drug trafficking," an epithet that virtually guaranteed him the bank's Triple A Customer Credit Rating.

Jonathan Bush opened an account for him personally, helped him establish two offshore hell corporations in the Belize called Ashcroft and Aitken (named after UK Tory ministers who had formal postgraduate qualifications in money laundering and perjury at Supreme Court level), and then opened more accounts in the name of those hell corporations both here, in the UK and in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia."

Re: Lord (Michael) Ashcroft of Belize, owner of Belize Bank and Trust and ex-Tory pary chairman investigated for cocaine smuggling and resultant money laundering: he bought a Boca Raton condo from Worldcom's Bernie Ebbers for a reputed $50 million in a development owned by William Stamps Farish III, the US Ambassador to UK who fled back home with his tail between his legs last month without any explanation....save that he has been Poppy's blind trust portfolio manager from 1980-88 and 1988-1992 as well as Junior's bagman while he was Gov of Texarse and since November 2000. Farish ousted just as Riggs was fined $25 million for money laundering and the Pinochet biz...

[seemslikeadream]

15. high value clients from the the Middle East and East Asia

JUST A REMINDER -- RIGGS 9/11


By Rupert Cornwell in Washington -- 17 July 2004
UK - Independent
Two months earlier Riggs was fined $25m for "wilful and systemic" violations of federal laws, over its reporting of cash transactions in Saudi embassy accounts, that have been under investigation for possible links to terrorist financing.

The Saudi embassy, one of the largest in the capital, insists that its 150 accounts have always been perfectly regular. Nor have any criminal charges been brought against Riggs employees. But the bank's dealings with both Saudi Arabia and Equatorial Guinea are still being investigated by a grand jury and other Congressional and federal investigators.

Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat, called the affair "a sordid story of a bank with a prestigious name, that blatantly ignored its obligations under our money-laundering laws".
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=541867

Something rotten in D.C. and with the press when by all appearances no responsibile investigative reporter has examined further the circumstances around the wire transfer from the Saudi Princess Haifa that ended up providing cash for the eventual hijackers who were in San Diego. I recall reading only ONE article on the Riggs collapse and scandal that even mentioned the fact that the President's uncle, Jonathan Bush was a top level executive with the Bank responsible for handling high value clients from the the Middle East and East Asia.


http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:GUIetnRdstQJ:www.911citizenswatch.org/modules.php%3Fop%3Dmodload%26name%3DNews%26file%3Darticle%26sid%3D363+%27World%27s+most+important+bank%27+sold+after+months+of+scandal&hl=en

[struggle4progress]

17. kick for BFEE stench

:kick:

[seemslikeadream]

18. Thanks struggle4progress, here's one more

The probe resulted from findings by U.S. Senate investigators into transactions at Riggs National Corp. (RIGS).

Making payments to officials of a West African country on the State Department's watch list for human rights abuses, would run the companies afoul of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

Each of the companies have denied anything improper occurred.

Devon Energy, of Oklahoma City, said to be the fourth largest oil company in the U.S., only recently acquired interests in the region upon the acquisition of Ocean Energy.

"We make every effort to conduct our business in a lawful and ethical manner and we have controls in place to prevent violations" an executive of the company was quoted as saying. "Recognizing that we recently acquired many of our international operations, including Equatorial Guinea, it is impossible to know everything that went on prior to our involvement. However, we are applying our standards and business practices to the operations acquired." At issue were payments made into Riggs for tuition for students, many of whom were found to be children or relatives of government officials.

Equatorial Guinea was Riggs largest customer, with some $700 million in accounts for the government, officials and relatives.

more
http://www.investors.com/breakingnews.asp?journalid=22565489&brk=1

:hi:

[al bupp]

23. Some Excellent Research in this Thread

Good work, seemslikeadream and snazzy, you both are a credit to your species.