Socialist Resistance

An archive of socialistresistance.org, 2002–2022

The scramble for Sudan's oil

Socialist Resistance no45  |  page 18-19

This is scanned newsprint, not web text. The original PDFs carried no text layer at all, so every word here was read off the page by OCR. Expect dropped opening letters, run-together words and wrong characters. There was no contents page to cut the paper up by, so the articles were found from the size of their headlines: a headline may carry its kicker, and where an article ran beside a boxed panel a few lines of the neighbour can appear. The scanned issue is the authority; this text is here so the words can be found at all.

Both the civil war now raging in Darfur and earlier conflict in Sudan between the North and the South have been fuelled by the fight for control of Sudan's oil resources.

The civil war of 1983 to 2005 was a period of shifting alliances. The US government switched its support from the Sudanese government to the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), fighting for self determination for the people of the South. After the Khartoum government sided found itself on a US list of states "sponsoring terrorism" and in 1997 the target of comprehensive US sanctions.

During the North-South conflict China, together with Sudanese and Malaysian companies, set up an oil company.

The company constructed a pipeline from the oilfields in the south to Port Sudan and carried Sudan's first oil exports in 1999.

This development led to US oil companies pressuring the US government to change its policy on Sudan and remove trade sanctions so that they could operate there.

The US brokered a peace deal, which ended the civil war between the North and South relations with Sudan, although it has not yet lifted trade sanctions.

It attempted to rein in China which had become Sudan's main trading partner. (During 2004, Sudan accounted for 16 million of the 30.1 million tons of overseas oil pumped by the China state oil company.)

It has been estimated that Sudan holds vast potential reserves of oil in the east and north-west of the country in addition to the south. Darfur is one of the regions where oil is present in abundant quantities and drilling began there in 2005.

Finding itself behind China in the race to control Sudan's oil the US is determined to make up for lost ground. Having to send peacekeeping troops to Darfur, it is in a better position through that body to influence the course of events there.

It will make sure that when the people of Darfur determine the status of their region in a referendum in 2010, the further exploitation of the oil resources will come up.

In the case of the South, the people have a right to self determination through a referendum in 2011.

If the South opts for independence from the Sudan, the US which has a great deal of influence with the SPLM, would be well positioned to ensure that the US oil companies play a big part in exploiting the oil wealth there.