MP and former Tory energy minister John Hayes has been paid 150,000 by oil firm BB Energy over three years. Four high-level suspects, including Hleiss, and Teddy Rahme and Ibrahim al-Zouk of ZR Energy, did not respond to court summons and arrest warrants were issued for them. He receives a salary of 25,000 a year. Tens of thousands of teachers take action, Some workers defied a government strike ban, Teachers report more picket lines than last time, This article is over 1 years, 3 months old, Its not just the bodies that Boris Johnson let pile highits the cash too, reports Sam Ord. Testimonies collected by Mount Lebanon Investigative Judge Nicolas Mansour as part of the preliminary investigation pointed to suspected shady deals to forge lab tests for the fuels quality specifications, and to the involvement of employees at the labs as well as senior officials at the Energy Ministry, including the director-general of oil installations, Sarkis Hleiss. Thats why the Tories manage to survive scandal after scandal. It has since been renewed four times. The response of Sonatrachs representative in Lebanon, Tarek Fawal, was quick, as he declared the companys willingness to cooperate with the Ministry of Energy to resolve the issues related to what he called the lack of conformity of the last shipment of fuel to the specifications, noting that this shipmentestimated at 38,000 tonswas examined by three different international offices who confirmed that it in fact met the specifications stipulated in the contract. Private landlords and housing associations may apply for a grant on behalf of tenants who meet the eligibility criteria. The UK energy industry is facing a wave of bankruptcies amid a gas supply crunch that has sent electricity prices soaring, leaving suppliers vulnerable . In 2003, for example, BB Naft agreed to guarantee and meet the obligations of a loan obtained by BB Energy (Asia) Pte Ltd. from the Standard Chartered Bank of Singapore. All rights reserved. MP and former Tory energy minister John Hayes has been paid 150,000 by oil firm BB Energy over three years. Russia has publicly said the U.S. sanctions are illegal and it would work with Venezuela to weather them. See here for a complete list of exchanges and delays. Reliance has said that in September 2012 it signed a 15-year deal to purchase up to 400,000 barrels a day of heavy crude from PDVSA. The women pushing boundaries in Pakistans rural milk marketIn rural Pakistan women milk cows, but male relatives take the milk to male-run collection centres. BBC World Service - The Fifth Floor, Lebanon: A web of corruption Lebanon: A web of corruption As Lebanon endures worsening blackouts and fuel shortages, BBC Arabic investigates the. In one email exchange in 2011 involving a British company representing ALIMPORT the Cuban state agency that handles food and agricultural imports, valued at nearly $2 billion in 2014 that wanted to open an account with the BBVA bank, a bank employee in Great Britain asked why documents related to Miramar Investment Corporation Ltd had been notarized in Switzerland. Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. This story was originally published June 7, 2016, 10:06 AM. Hayes, who was once described as the champion of the motorist during his time as a transport minister, also recently contributed to a report critical of the government's net-zero policies. The CEEC was made up of local residents who are . Companies registered abroad are legally not Cuban, according to the source, and could be used for dollar-denominated transactions. This article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. Companies with Cuban capital or activities on the island. BBE maintains . By. The decision to award ZR Energy DMCC a new contract, despite its alleged involvement in the tainted fuel case, was explained by the presumption of innocence a principle applicable as long as no [verdict] was issued, an official source said. Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnsons former senior adviser, says that the attempt to discredit the system that found then MP Owen Paterson guilty was really about the PM and his own lies. Read about our approach to external linking. This is ostensibly because it was hard for the judiciary to find evidence linking ZR Energy DDMC and ZR Group Holding SAL, despite the testimonies collected by Mansour. The report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Fair Fuel for UK Motorists and UK Hauliers decries the environmental evangelism and virtue signalling of the governments plan to phase out new petrol and diesel engines by 2030. Records of a meeting in Dubai in March of 2011 reflect a decision to significantly reduce the capital of BB Naft, held by BB Energy Holdings NV., from $8 million to $1.050 million. BB Naft was listed in the Cuban registry of foreign companies operating on the island as of April of this year, with Riad Bassatne as director. Ltd., in February of this year to import 2,880,000 barrels of diesel fuel. BB Energy is not known to be involved in fracking but says that it sells oil around the world - and is one of the largest traders in the Mediterranean. 2022 LOrient-Le Jour. Furthermore, in this context, the Lebanese judiciarys decision to seize this file can be explained long after companies have been getting commissions on the import of fuel. The Venezuelan companys shipping schedules showed that Reliance was loading a cargo from PDVSA as recently as April 20. Listed as a director of one of the companies is a brother of Gen. Luis Alberto Rodrguez Lpez-Calleja husband of Cuban ruler Raul Castros daughter and powerful head of the Cuban armed forces business conglomerate, GAESA. BB Energy Group has invested in Gasmeth Energy Global, a company focused on the responsibly extraction, processing, and distribution of methane gas from Rwandas Lake Kivu, one of the African Great Lakes. Sir John's earnings put him among the most well paid MPs. Please enable JavaScript in your browser to submit the form, - | 01.03.2023. All rights reserved. Please check individual images for licensing details. For its part, ZR Energy DMCC denied any involvement in illegal practices. Socialist Worker (unless otherwise stated). The governments own Climate Change Committee warned in March that there is little, if any, room for increased fossil gas consumption if the goals of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement are to be met. The company opened an office in Cuba, he explained, because he has been a resident of Havana like his wife and three children, all of them born in Cuba and Cuban citizens. Twice he was found in breach of the rules on declarations of benefits. After the report was published, Reliance did not respond to further questions from Reuters about why the PDVSA internal document proposed Reliance pay Rosneft a marketing fee related to the supply of crude under the Indian firms long-term supply contract with PDVSA. One lawyer for BB Naft, Noureddine Kabalan, asked Mossack Fonseca in April of 2008 to create a power of attorney so that the empowered person can be authorized to sign on behalf of the company in Syria and Iraq for specific transactions.. When he was appointed, Hayes said he would advise the company on strategic plans in the context of changes in the worldwide energy market. Since the Tories takeover of parliament in 2010, nine of the partys former treasurerswho donated huge amountswere given a position as a Lord. The contract may be summarized as follows: Sonatrach will give its name to the shipments of Baha Bassatne, who buys fuel from the Swiss company Vitol, for 3.5 dollars per metric ton, while he makes 25 dollars as profit in his deals with the end customer in Lebanon. Still, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), which enforces sanctions, has given no indications it would take that route. John Hayes earns 50,000 per year as a strategic advisor for BB Energy, a major trader in crude oil and other petrochemical products. ZR Group and Mr. Rahmeh were unlawfully indicted on a number of charges, of which all but one have been dropped. The Cuban military is estimated to control at least 60 percent of the islands economy. The document showed that PDVSA and Reliance would pay Rosneft a marketing fee equivalent to around 3 percent of the sale price, split between them. BB Energy Group Holding Ltd. (DIFC) is managed by a Board of Directors comprising seven board members with five executive members and two non-executive members. BB Energy is part of the Electricity, Oil & Gas industry, and located in United Kingdom. Starting in the early 1990s, Cubas Ministry of Foreign Trade, through the Compaa Panamericana S.A, used Mossack Fonseca to create a string of disguised companies in Panama, the Bahamas and the British Virgin Islands that bought and sold medicines, cigars and food. The leaked documents confirm the existence of these types of foreign companies, with at least partial Cuban government capital. There is no overlap of ownership or management between the two companies, a representative of ZR Energy DMCC told Le Commerce du Levant. The efforts to hide the Cuban governments hand in the offshore companies means that its officials, lawyers and other employees used as stand-ins could eventually become the effective beneficiaries of the shares in those companies. The company said it saved Ghana over $2.8million when it sold the crude to the firm at a discount of $2 instead of the normal $5 a barrel. Please detail the London Energy Project's revenue received, costs incurred and breakdown for both (ie where money was received from and how it was spent) for financial years 2015/16, 2016/17, 2017/18, 2018/19 and budget for 2019/20. For over five decades we have been applying our depth of specialist experience to oil refining, logistics, storage and financing across the world. The government was forced to go back on itself and announced there would be a vote on Patersons suspension. According to an undated internal PDVSA document, Indias Reliance Industries Ltd - PDVSAs largest cash-paying client was also asked by PDVSA to pay Rosneft directly in April for oil sales under a long-term supply contract with the Venezuelan company. He has also compared climate activists to radical Islam. Few traders had room to receive physical barrels at Cushing. Real-time updates and all local stories you want right in the palm of your hand. Its ownership was in the form of anonymous bearer shares the owners are whoever has those shares. Tory MP Bill Wiggin gained 25,000 in bonuses and fees from a tax dodging wealth management firm in Bermuda. They have not been called to account for the 37 billion spent on a failing test and trace system. One knowledgeable source who asked to remains anonymous said the Cuban government also has registered companies, ships and airplanes in Panama and other countries to get around the embargo and avoid court-ordered seizures to settle its many debts abroad. The analysis and opinions they express through LOGI are their own and do not reflect the view of their respective employers. 310. Lucia Kassai and . A former Conservative minister who has criticised climate change policies and joined calls to restart fracking has been paid 150,000 by an oil firm, openDemocracy can reveal. NAFT TRADING S.A. That the energy industry carries heightened corruption risks is well documented: when the OECD analysed 427 anti-bribery enforcement actions in 2014, they found that almost one in five related to the extractive industries. The Public Prosecution in Mount Lebanon has triggered a heavy-caliber scandal, by arresting two dealers who were supposed to supply the Lebanese Electricity Company with Algerian fuel used in generating electricity. I think we have more confidence in what didnt happen than what did.. Campuses would have to give up testing resources and send them to Randox, they continued. The development has had mixed reactions. In 1963 they entered the oil sector in Lebanon and were primarily involved in local marketing of oil products and importation of Bitumen. Paterson had, on 16 occasions, used his House of Commons office for meetings relating to his private business interests. Some 22 of the biggest donors have gained a seat in the House of Lords in the past 11 years. I understand Mr. Dupont-Willemin is a Swiss lawyer and I believe it is for the documents to be more transparent and trustworthy. These high paid speeches have addressed bank JP Morgan Chase and World 50 Incan exclusive club for senior executives. In view of the foregoing debate, were forced to return to the commercial relationship between Sonatrach and the Lebanese Ministry of Energy, and the pressure exercised by former Sonatrach CEO, Abdelmoumen Ould Kaddour, to adopt ZR Energy trading company as a second intermediary besides Baha Bassatne, as a supplier in the Algerian companys name; the thing that occurred a year and a half before opening the file. My journey to journalism: Elodie TotoElodie Toto of BBC Afrique tells the story of what inspired her to become a journalist, and takes us on a journey from the suburbs of Paris to Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. BB Energy is one of the world's leading independent energy trading companies. During his time as energy minister, Hayes caused controversy by refusing to support any further expansion to onshore wind power, describing wind turbines as a terrible intrusion. Miqati Says Cyprus Still Waiting for Lebanon's Ratification of Maritime Border Agreement. 3. The Panama Papers show Dupont-Willemin as a director of a total of 49 offshore companies in the British Virgin Islands, five in Panama and two each in the Bahamas and Seychelles islands. Our operations in these products are global and we use our storage and logistics for blending and optimising timely deliveries to fulfil customer requirements. Tory whips threatened MPs with the loss of local funding unless they fell into line. The case has revealed the need to make all state contracts in the energy sector publicly available, including a 20-year contract signed in 2018 with Russian company Rosneft to rehabilitate and manage the Tripoli Oil Installations. The current legal proceeding is limited to the Baltic, the ship carrying the poor-quality fuel, which was delivered in March 2020 by ZR Energy DMCC. Tainted fuel scandal: 22 people and entities to stand trial. The latter said in a televised address that he discouraged Hleiss, one of his childhood friends, from going to the court. I feel they are trying to bury this issue in the courts by stopping at mid-level employees, Yacoubian said. The news website Diario de Cuba has identified the director of foreign investments at the Foreign Trade Ministry, Dborah Rivas Saavedra, as another of the directors of Racuza, Miramar Investment Corporation Ltd and Caribbean Sugar Trader. Reports obtained by LOGI show that tests of one batch of fuel showed it could contain chemical waste. The quality of the fuel was so bad that it caused material damage to turbines at both the Jiyeh and Zouk power plants. MPs duly voted for it. 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