Let’s hope tumblr’s resolved their ‘technical issues’ and this posts XP.

Firstly, I think that the most important aspect of any cause is the sentiments of the people that the cause purports to want to help. As far as KONY 2012 is concerned, I’ve only read/seen extremely negative reactions from Ugandans:

This is just one of the many Ugandans speaking out against the KONY 2012 campaign.

On top of that, when the film was shown in Uganda to a group that contained victims of Kony’s crimes, it caused outrage -against the campaign mind, not Kony (who’s a horrible person in his own right but this so-called campaign is a farce).

That’s more than enough to turn me away from this movement and find a better, more reliable way to help but if you want more information, I’ve answered a question about KONY 2012 before here.

Since I wrote that, more information damning the credibility of KONY 2012 and the organization behind it, Invisible Children, has come out:

Turns out that Uganda may have what is the biggest onshore oil reserve in Africa, which was discovered in 2009, but coincidentally wouldn’t be ready for commercial production until 2012.

It gets worse. Chase Bank donated 1 million dollars to Invisible Children, turns out JP Morgan Chase is also a major investor of Tullow Oil, turns out Tullow Oil does business in Uganda.

So my advice would be to stay away from this campaign. At best they’re extremely ignorant, at worst they’re exploiting the suffering of thousands of people to make a quick buck.

If you’re interested in reading a couple of good articles on KONY 2012, you’re welcome to go through my KONY 2012 tag.

24/03/2012

GAZA CITY (Ma’an) — A seven-month-old baby in Gaza died on Friday evening after medical equipment he was connected to switched off as a result of a power cut, a Hamas-affiliated TV channel said.

Gaza medical spokesman Adham Abu Salmiya confirmed the incident, adding that the infant was born with respiratory problems and doctors had recommended the use of mechanical breathing apparatus to be used at home.

The father of the child had turned on the apparatus before going to sleep but during the night a power cut caused it to switch off, resulting in the infant’s death, Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV reported.

The child was the “first victim of the current power crisis in Gaza,” Abu Salmiya said, warning that the medical sector in the coastal enclave is in jeopardy.
Recent fuel shortages have had a catastrophic effect on daily life in the Gaza Strip, with people facing daily power cuts of up to 18 hours a day.

Ma’an

I can’t even… seven months old.

This is the state of things that Gazans have to deal with every fucking day even when Israeli F-16s aren’t buzzing over their heads at 3AM.

Hamas has blamed the recent energy crisis on everyone from Israel and the Palestinian Authority to Egypt.

But basically it’s the addition of the Israeli blockade on Gaza and the recent clamp down by Egyptian authorities on fuel that is normally smuggled into Gaza causing the Gaza power plant to shut down.

I don’t even understand what we can do to help, unlike food shortages which can be ‘helped’ through charity, this is all bureaucratic bullshit.

What a motherfucking coincidence.

Posted 16/10/2011

14 Jan 2009 “The Times” - -Heritage Oil announced details of a large oil discovery in Uganda yesterday, which the company claimed could be the largest onshore discovery in sub-Saharan Africa.

Heritage said that its latest discovery – Giraffe1 – in the Lake Albert region, could total at least 400 million barrels of oil.

However, Paul Atherton, chief financial officer, told The Times that the wider field it was developing, dubbed Buffalo-Giraffe, had several “billions of barrels of oil in place”, although it was unclear how much of this would be recoverable.

He said that the field, which is 9,000 square kilometers in size – or six times the size of Greater London – was unquestionably the largest onshore discovery made in sub-Saharan Africa in at least 20 years, possibly ever.

Mr Atherton said that of the 18 wells the company had drilled in the basin so far, all had produced oil. “Clearly the entire basin is full of oil,” he said. “It’s a world-class discovery, the most exciting new basin in Africa in decades.”

Previously, the largest onshore fields discovered in sub-Saharan Africa were at Rabi-Kounga in Gabon, where 900 million barrels were found in 1985, and at Kome in Chad, where 485 million barrels were found in 1977.

Mr Atherton said that it would take at least another three years to start commercial production. [this was posted in 2009, do the math] The crude could be exported by road or rail, he said, but analysts believe that the most practical solution would be to build an 806-mile pipeline to take it to Kampala, Uganda’s capital, and then the Kenyan coast. The pipeline would need to be heated and designed to traverse swampy and mountainous land. It would cost an estimated $1.5 billion (£1 billion) to complete.

Heritage and its partner Tullow Oil, which also has a 50 per cent equity stake in the project, would need to demonstrate that the field could produce at least 400 million barrels of oil to justify the cost of building such a pipeline. Richard Griffith, an Evolution Securities analyst, said the latest discovery “thrashed” this commerciality threshold.

See Also - Uganda : Pressure Mounts To Make Public Oil Agreements:Uganda’s oil discovery is already attracting major players like Italian oil giant Eni Spa, U.S. Exxon Mobil, France’s Total and of recent the China National Offshore Oil Company. The country does not have the funds to finance the production of oil and instead signed agreements with oil giants spelling out how the revenue will be shared with investors willing to fund the production phase. The companies will build an oil refinery in Uganda and an oil pipeline to the Indian Ocean. This will enable the landlocked country to sell its estimated two billion barrels of crude oil internationally

Uganda’s oil contracts leaked - a bad deal made worse: The repeated claims by the Ugandan government and the oil companies that Uganda has received a very good deal and the best in the region are not only a fiction, but were reliant on the real terms of the contracts being kept secret. While the contracts will deliver vast profits to Tullow Oil and Heritage Oil, the contracts will prevent the Ugandan people from receiving their due benefits.

Oil extraction and the potential for domestic instability in Uganda: The paper identifies and discusses in detail three sources of domestic volatility that may arise as a result of oil development.

Uganda: Oil could cause war : The attacks are by armed gangs suspected to be rebels of the FDLR, LRA, and the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF). In the ongoing campaign in DR Congo, President Joseph Kabila is being criticised for failing to restore peace in this vital area.

Watch the video at link ^ Canadians this is very, extremely important.

The main water source is contaminated. The animals that are the main food source are becoming deformed. The communities themselves are being ravaged with fatal sicknesses way beyond normal statistical levels.

Must read for a little clarity and comprehensible discussion about all this madness surrounding Iran.

docshoe:

stay-human and I have been shooting messages back and forth, chewing over the possibility of an American intervention in Iran.  I’m a burnt-out Iraq vet here in America, she’s an idealistic kid living in the Middle East, and for all the obvious reasons neither of us are happy about this possibility.  Here’s a message I sent her which I offer here as my best attempt to explain why our leaders seem so eager to take our botched War On Terror to a frightening new level: 

My government has got this ugly history of using other parts of the world like they belong to us.  Latin America, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, etc.  We’re heavily involved in the Middle East for one big reason: Oil.  It’s very profitable to exercise a certain amount of control over politics in that region, because that’s how you control the oil.  [NOTE: For more on this, see my essay Why We’re At War.]  So that’s what we do. We end up fighting wars that are very costly to our taxpayers and our soldiers, but the corporate interests that basically run this country make a lot of money off of shenanigans like our War On Terror.

War happens because it’s profitable, or because it’s necessary to kill someone who’s interfering with the profits.  Since those corporate interests I mentioned are making a lot of money by exercising control over the Middle East, they would stand to lose some of that money if anyone interfered with their control.  And that’s what Iran could potentially do.

Here’s a hypothetical situation: Let’s say Iran got nukes.  In all likelihood they don’t have nukes, of course, but just humor me with this Worst Case Scenario, alright?  Iran having nuclear weapons would put a serious damper on our ability to attack or otherwise manipulate countries in that area because Iran could potentially threaten us with a nuclear option of their own.  Just imagine if Iran’s government had the power to tell us, “End your drone attacks on Pakistan, or we’ll shove a nuke up your ass.”  It would totally upset the balance of power!  That is to say, it would make American interests far less powerful in that region.  Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, of course—after what I saw in Iraq I’m of the opinion that maybe the Middle East would be better off without our “help”—but you can see how certain corporate and political interests would be very pissed off about this, because it would hit them where it counts: their bank accounts.

Understand, even if Iran develops nukes, Americans are not in any real danger.  Our military has got a sixty-some years’ head start developing our own highly sophisticated nuclear arsenal, so realistically we could wipe Iran off the map loooooong before they got a chance to launch even one lousy missile.  But we could only do that if they struck first.   A preemptive nuclear strike on Iran would be a political disaster to put it mildly.  It would make us the Bad Guys.

Here’s something about American culture that I’m not sure the rest of the world fully understands: Americans have this obsession with being the Good Guys.  Imagine if Roy Rogers was a political superpower, and that’s what Americans try to be, the key word being “try.”  We do terrible things sometimes, but we are always led to do so for very idealistic (though often misguided) reasons.  Men like Bush know this and they use it to manipulate us.  If Bush had said, “We’re going to invade Iraq so my friends can make a bunch of money,” he would have been impeached the very next day.  Impeached, hell—we’d have lynched the bastard, him and his whole cabinet, right on the White House lawn.  But Bush was able to draw us into a corrupt mess of a war because he kept telling us, “We’re liberating Iraq!  We’re rescuing these poor people from Saddam Hussein!  We’re making the world a safer place!  Iraqis will greet us as liberators!  And if they’re not with us, they’re with the terrorists—the Bad Guys!  So SIC ‘EM!”  I don’t know if this sounds like a bad joke to you, but I promise I am being very serious.  Never, ever underestimate the American people’s need to feel like we’re a force for good in the world.

So anyhow, like I was saying, even if Iran had nukes they would still pose no real threat to us.  Americans are safe, but the political and corporate interests who dictate our policies would find themselves in a very awkward position.  They would have the power to destroy Iran, but it would be political suicide to do so.  (Because Americans refuse to be the Bad Guys.)  So they would have to make concessions to Iran’s wishes.  But they really don’t want to do that.  It hurts their pride, for one thing, and it could hurt their pocketbooks. 

Remember that hypothetical situation, where Iran threatens to use its nukes if we don’t stop fucking with Pakistan?  Think how it would look to the rest of the world, to our allies, and even to our own citizens (i.e., guys like me), if we used our nukes on Iran, even if Iran had threatened us.  I’ll tell you how it would look: We just murdered millions of people because their government tried to stop us from killing their neighbors.  It would be politically indefensible.  Heads would roll. 

Basically, a nuclear Iran could find themselves in a very negotiable position, much like North Korea.  Sure, we’d technically be capable of defeating them, but American voters and American allies won’t stand for such an atrocity.  The Powers That Be would be forced to respect Iran’s sovereignty.  And if there’s one thing American interests aren’t very good at, it’s respecting the sovereignty of governments in the Middle East.

I worry that what I’ve written is all garbled and confused.  Let me put it this way: My government likes to think it owns the Middle East, and it’s outraged and a little frightened that Iran is wiggling out from under our thumb.  We’re afraid we might be losing our grip.  Have you ever read about the British and the Falklands War?  An empire in decline can do very stupid and dangerous things.

But I also think your father is right that it’s mostly posturing.  Sure, certain of our leaders would love to invade Iran, but guys like me—i.e., American voters—won’t stand for it.  They’ve been floating the idea around since the Bush administration and it’s never been popular with most Americans.  We’d need a huge motivation to justify that kind of drastic action to the voters, and I’m talking huge like 9/11 was huge.  Because Americans are not necessarily a warlike people, even though our government loves sending us to war. (Like I said, we’re desperate to be the Good Guys, and our collective shame over our botched War On Terror has made us even more desperate to be the Good Guys.)

Because this is an election year, our candidates—most of whom are wimps and draft-dodgers—are going to talk big about attacking Iran because they think that makes them look decisive and bold and Hawkish and therefore highly electable as Commander In Chief.  And the sad thing is, this trick works.  Bush never served overseas, but because he proudly sent guys like me to war, the media depicted Bush as some kind of warrior.  It’s not fair but that’s how it works, I guess.

So the candidates—and I’m not just talking about the Republicans here, because Obama has played the same game a time or two—these assholes are going to talk big about Iran even if they have no serious plans to attack.  It’s all a game, played by people who don’t care how scary that game makes us look to the rest of the world.

Oh, that’s the other thing you need to understand about America.  Our political leaders are Prima Donnas.  They like to pretend they have more power than they really do.  Kinda like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  They’re all playing a very dangerous game of “chicken,” except it’s with our lives instead of their own.  Thoughts like that keep me warm at night.

Keep on rockin’ in the Free World,

Doc Shoe

PS: What do you think?

Now that you’ve read this, you should all definitely read Why We’re At War, I swear to you it is one of the best-written articles you will read about the Iraq War.

25th February, 2012

Government offers humanitarian aid and security assistance in the hope of a stake in country’s future energy industry.

18th September, 2011

Many people living near the site of the BP oil spill have reported a long list of similar health problems.

Oil, tar balls, tar mats, and dead animals are still common sights along the Gulf of Mexico [Erika Blumenfeld/Al Jazeera]

Just weeks after BP’s oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico began on April 20, 2010, Fritzi Presley knew something was very wrong with her health.

The 57-year-old singer/songwriter from Long Beach, Mississippi began to feel sick, and went to her doctor.

“I began getting treatments for bronchitis, was put on several antibiotics and rescue inhalers, and even a breathing machine,” she told Al Jazeera. The smell of chemicals on the Mississippi coastline is present on many days when wind blows in from the Gulf.

Presley’s list of symptoms mirrors what many people living in the areas affected by BP’s oil spill have told Al Jazeera.

“I was having them then, and still have killer headaches. I’m experiencing memory loss, and when I had my blood tested for chemicals, they found m,p-Xylene, hexane, and ethylbenzene in my body.”

The 4.9 million barrels of oil spilled into the Gulf last year was the largest accidental marine oil spill in history, affecting people living near the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.

Compounding the problem, BP has admitted to using at least 1.9 million gallons of toxic dispersants, which are banned by many countries, including the UK. According to many scientists, these dispersants create an even more toxic substance when mixed with crude oil.

Dr Wilma Subra, a chemist in New Iberia, Louisiana, has tested the blood of BP cleanup workers and residents.

“Ethylbenzene, m,p-Xylene and hexane are volatile organic chemicals that are present in the BP crude oil,” Subra explained to Al Jazeera. “The acute impacts of these chemicals include nose and throat irritation, coughing, wheezing, lung irritation, dizziness, light-headedness, nausea and vomiting.”

Subra explained that exposure has been long enough to create long-term effects, such as “liver damage, kidney damage, and damage to the nervous system. So the presence of these chemicals in the blood indicates exposure”.

Testing by Subra has also revealed BP’s chemicals are present “in coastal soil sediment, wetlands, and in crab, oyster and mussel tissues”.

Pathways of exposure to the dispersants are inhalation, ingestion, and skin and eye contact. Symptoms of exposure include headaches, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pains, chest pains, respiratory system damage, skin sensitisation, hypertension, central nervous system depression, neurotoxic effects, genetic mutations, cardiac arrhythmia, and cardiovascular damage. The chemicals can also cause birth defects, mutations, and cancer.

Joseph Yerkes, from Okaloosa Island, Florida, was in BP’s oil clean-up programme for more than two months, during which time he was exposed to oil and dispersants on a regular basis.

“My health worsened progressively,” Yerkes said. “Mid-September [2010] I caught a cold that worsened until I went to a doctor, who gave me two rounds of antibiotics for the pneumonia-like symptoms, and he did blood tests and found high levels of toxic substances in my blood that he told me came from the oil and dispersants.”

Since then, his life has been overrun with health problems and trying to get compensation from BP for his health costs and lost livelihood.

“They’ve [BP] not paid me a dime, and I’m scared,” Yerkes, whose lawyers were told by the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, which was set up by BP to administer compensation payments, that his health claim was “compensable”. Yerkes added, “I’m moving out of my house into a one-bedroom apartment, and have sold just about everything I have. BP is starving us out.”

Yerkes has begun cutting out parts of the detoxification programme his doctor had prescribed for him because he can’t afford it. He then began getting sick again.

“If they [BP] don’t do what they agreed to do, I’m in trouble. “

- Joseph Yerkes 

“I don’t know what I’ll do now,” Yerkes added, “Because I’ve spent $50,000 on medical, treatments, supplements, and having to move from the Gulf. If they [BP] don’t do what they agreed to do, I’m in trouble.”

His memory loss has become so bad that Yerkes has tried to adjust his life around it by leaving himself notes. Some days, his body aches so much, and his nausea is so severe, he is unable to get out of bed.

“I consider myself a tough person, but this has been the hardest thing I’ve ever had to go through,” he said.

‘Dying from the inside out’ 

Presley lives three blocks from the coast with her daughter, 30-year-old Daisy Seal, who has also become extremely sick.

Both of them had their blood tested for the chemicals present in BP’s oil, and six out of the 10 chemicals tested for were present.

Daisy Seal has had skin rashes, respiratory problems, and two miscarriages, which she attributes to chemicals from BP’s oil and toxic dispersants [Erika Blumenfeld/Al Jazeera]

“I started having respiratory problems, a horrible skin rash, headaches, nosebleeds, low energy, and trouble sleeping,” Seal told Al Jazeera. “And I now feel like I’m dying from the inside out.”

Seal, who already has an eight-year-old son, has had two miscarriages in the last year.

“In ‘Generations at Risk’, medical doctor Ted Schettler and others warn that solvents can rapidly enter the human body,” Dr Riki Ott, a toxicologist, marine biologist, and Exxon Valdez survivor, told Al Jazeera. “They evaporate in air and are easily inhaled, they penetrate skin easily, and they cross the placenta into fetuses. For example, 2-butoxyethanol [a chemical used in Corexit, an oil dispersant] is a human health hazard substance; it is a fetal toxin and it breaks down blood cells, causing blood and kidney disorders.”

“Solvents dissolve oil, grease, and rubber,” Ott continued. “Spill responders have told me that the hard rubber impellors in their engines and the soft rubber bushings on their outboard motor pumps are falling apart and need frequent replacement. Given this evidence, it should be no surprise that solvents are also notoriously toxic to people, something the medical community has long known.”

Dr Rodney Soto, a medical doctor in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida, has been testing and treating patients with high levels of oil-related chemicals in their blood streams.

These chemicals are commonly referred to as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).

VOCs released in BP’s oil disaster are toxic and have chronic health effects.

Dr Soto, who is Yerkes’ doctor, is finding high levels of toxic chemicals in every one of the patients he is testing.

“I’m regularly finding between five and seven VOCs in my patients,” Dr Soto told Al Jazeera. “These patients include people not directly involved in the oil clean-up, as well as residents that do not live right on the coast. These are clearly related to the oil disaster.”

While there are many examples of acute exposures, Dr Soto’s main concern is that most residents who are being exposed will only show symptoms later.

“I’m concerned with the illnesses like cancer and brain degeneration for the future,” he told Al Jazeera. “This is very important because a lot of the population down here may not have symptoms. But people are unaware they are ingesting chemicals that are certainly toxic to humans and have significant effect on the brain and hormonal systems.”

The toxic compounds in the oil and dispersants are liposoluble, meaning they have a high affinity for fat, said Dr Soto.

Dr Soto continued: “The human brain is 70 per cent fat. And these will similarly affect the immune cells, intestinal tract, breast, thyroid, prostate, glands, organs, and systems. This is also why this is so significant for children.”

Exceeding thresholds

In March the US National Institutes of Health launched a long-range health study of workers who helped clean up after BP’s oil disaster.

According to the NIH, 55,000 clean-up workers and volunteers in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida will be checked for health problems, and participants will be followed for up to 10 years.

The study is funded by NIH, which received a $10m “gift” from BP to run the study. BP claims not to be involved in the study, which will cost $34m over the next five years.

But the study focusses mainly on people who participated in the clean-up.

John Gooding, a resident of Pass Christian, Mississippi, began having health problems shortly after the oil spill started. He has become sicker with each passing month, and has moved inland in an effort to escape

Mississippi resident John Gooding moved away from the coast to minimise his exposure to toxic chemicals [Erika Blumenfeld/Al Jazeera]

continuing exposure to the chemicals.

“I can’t live at my home address anymore because it’s too close to the coast,” Gooding told Al Jazeera. “I’m hypersensitive to the pollution, and there is a constant steady chemical smell coming off the Gulf. Even both my dogs had seizures and died.”

Gooding suffers respiratory problems, seizures, and myriad other heath effects. He has filed a claim with BP in hopes of being compensated for his health problems, but it has been denied.

BP hired attorney Kenneth Feinberg and his Washington-based firm, Feinberg Rozen, to manage their compensation fund. BP has paid the firm $850,000 a month to administer the $20bn compensation fund for Gulf residents and fishermen affected by the disaster.

The fund was set up after negotiations between BP and the Obama administration, but over recent months there have been growing concerns among the Gulf Coast’s residents that Feinberg is limiting compensation funds to claimants in order to decrease BP’s liability.

Feinberg told citizen journalism group Bridge the Gulf that he will be calling on “independent experts” to review the validity of the approximately 30 health claims that are currently “in limbo”. Feinberg was unable to name the independent experts, and did not elaborate on the process used to pick them. 

In a previous interview, Feinberg said he had received approximately 200 health claims and denied them all for lack of documentation.

“As long as we have people making excuses for them [BP], they’ll continue to get away with it,” Gooding told Al Jazeera, while walking along a Mississippi beach covered in tar balls and dead birds.

Gooding is visibly sick, and chemicals that are used in oil dispersants have been found in his blood, but he won’t go to the doctor.

“I don’t want to put my family in debt, so I’m weighing my options,” he said, “I don’t have health insurance, but I do have life insurance.”

“We were recently in DC with those people protesting the Tar Sands pipeline,” he said. “I was telling those people living near the proposed pipeline, ‘We are your future, because when you have oil spills, this is what your life is going to look like.’”

Dispersants will continue to be used

The US Coast Guard held an Area Contingency Plan meeting in Biloxi, Mississippi on September 7 to discuss the lessons of the BP disaster.

Oil and sheen on a beach in Mississippi, September 2011 [Erika Blumenfeld/Al Jazeera]

Al Jazeera asked Coast Guard Captain John Rose, a sector commander, what has changed regarding the Coast Guard’s dispersant use policy since April 20, 2010.

“We were pre-authorised to use it before, but now we have to get permission from the higher-ups. But it is still in the plan for how we will respond to oil spills in the future,” he said.

During the meeting, Captain Rose continuously referred to the use of dispersants as a “scientific tool” that is “effective in keeping oil from reaching beaches and wildlife”.

Charles Taylor, a resident of nearby Bay St Louis, stood up and announced, “I’ve had bloody diarrhoea nonstop for 45 days, I’m anemic and dehydrated. I’ve had VOC tests done and have ethylbenzene, m,p-Xylene, and methelpentates in my blood”.

None of the Coast Guard personnel would address Taylor’s concerns, saying that the purpose of the meeting was not to discuss BP.

Taylor asked Captain Rose and the other Coast Guard personnel on the panel, “How much money has BP given you folks? Because it appears to us, who are having health problems, you are being silenced from addressing the dispersant and health issues”.

Inadequate compensation

Untold numbers of Gulf Coast residents continue to struggle with health issues and lack of adequate compensation from BP.

Joseph Yerkes is concerned about his future. ”I’m financially destroyed, and my health is bad,” he said. “I’m having to cut off parts of my treatment because I can’t afford it all, and I’m just trying to survive.”

“I’m one step away from being homeless, and not being able to support my daughter and myself,” Yerkes added.

Follow Dahr Jamail on Twitter: @DahrJamail

See a photo gallery of the current oil leaks in the Gulf of Mexico.

2nd September, 2011

BEIRUT: The European Union banned oil imports from Syria on Friday in a move that will cost the embattled regime millions of dollars each day as it tries to crush a resilient uprising that has railed against the country’s authoritarian government for more than five months.

President Bashar Assad’s assault on protests continued, killing at least 14 people, activists said. Security forces fired on thousands of anti-government protesters and surrounded mosques to prevent worshippers from streaming into the streets to join the rallies.

The UN estimates some 2,200 people have been killed since March as protesters take to the streets every week, despite the near-certainty that they will face a barrage of bullets and sniper fire. But the regime is in no imminent danger of collapse, leading to concerns violence will escalate.

On Friday, Syrian protesters marched under the slogan “Death Rather Than Humiliation” — reflecting a growing frustration among activists that their largely peaceful gatherings have failed to crack the regime.

Recent weeks have seen a subtle change in tone among some protesters who are calling on Syrians to take up arms and inviting foreign military action like the intervention that helped topple the Libyan government.

The EU oil ban follows other international sanctions and worldwide reproach, although Assad has brushed off the condemnation as foreign meddling. The oil embargo is significant because Damascus gets about 28 percent of its revenue from the oil trade and sells fuel to France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands.

Syria exports some 150,000 barrels of oil per day, with the vast majority going to the European Union.

Arab News