Iraq democracy must come before oil: Chalabi

[leftchick]

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-02-01T123202Z_01_VAT000097_RTRUKOC_0_US-ENERGY-CHALABI.xml&archived=False

VIENNA (Reuters) - Democracy in Iraq may come at the expense of a rapid recovery in the country's exports that have fallen to pre-war levels, the country's deputy prime minister Ahmad Chalabi said on Wednesday.

"Iraqi people are just emerging from decades of dictatorship. Oil belongs to the people not to the government," Chalabi told Reuters in an interview.

Despite decades of sanctions and wars, Baghdad under former president Saddam Hussein managed to ship around 1.7 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil to world markets, compared with just over one million bpd now.

But those exports came at a huge price, Chalabi said.

"Did you look at the cost of the process? ... Those people who suffered and got killed and had their relatives in mass graves? They have been cut off from the process," he told Reuters, speaking the day after an OPEC meeting here.

"It's worth waiting for the political process to take its course.... People see confusion and .... chaos, but people are learning the limits of democracy, the limits of freedom."

[Eugene]

1. What Chalabi really meant was...

Iraqi oil should stay put until duly constituted officials (read Chalabi & Co.)
are in position to exploit it, (in the name of the Iraqi People, of course).
Amid the gobbledygook, his point is that "rump" factions like the Kurds
should not make deals to pump his the Iraqi People's oil.