The vast
fossil fuel reserves of present day Azerbaijan have been exploited for
centuries. In the 7th century CE camels were loaded with “bales” of
oil for heating, light, warfare and medicine. Marco Polo told of a “fountain of
oil…which is good for burning. In the neighbouring country no other is used in
their lamps and the people come from distant parts to procure it.” As then, so
too today. Azerbaijan along with Georgia, rarely figure prominently in the mind
of the average European or North American, but they should. The two are part of
the 2000km Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline that pumps one million barrels of
oil daily to be loaded at the Turkish port of Ceyhan on tankers bound for
European markets. The Oil Road exposes the corrupt relationship between oil
companies and governments that put millions in companies’ pockets while causing
misery for those living in the pipeline’s path.
The impetus
for the BTC – the Oil Road of the title – came from Washington, London and
Brussels, all of which wanted an “energy corridor” that would both bypass
Russia and guarantee the supply of oil and gas to the global market economy by
giving governments via the oil company BP control over the supply route. In the
early 1990s Azerbaijan was in a situation that Western governments and BP could
exploit: the USSR had just collapsed, the local economy was depressed, and there
was a desire for Western recognition as an independent country. Leader Heydar
Aliyev was willing to mortgage the country’s resources to get hard currency
and, hopefully, regain the land it lost during its war with Armenia. Georgia
and Turkey had parallel reasons for signing on to the BTC project. The deal
eventually agreed upon is referred to as the “Contract of the Century” and what
the FT later dubbed “the most controversial pipeline project” in history, for
what the host countries gave up and what BP was able to win.
Near the
start of the authors’ journey along the pipeline route, in Baku, they spoke
with a human rights activist about how oil projects allow authoritarian regimes
to gain wealth from resources rather than citizens’ taxes, making the needs of
the population irrelevant. “…Europe, the US and the companies wanted more oil.
Heydar Aliyev offered to give them control over our oil and its export route,
and in return got unlimited rights to rule this country as he wanted.” Those
unlimited rights include using brute force to silence opposition to the regime
on pipeline-related issues, and to remove citizens’ freedom of assembly. When
in Georgia, residents told how the pipeline runs a mere 25m from their homes,
and how digging the pipeline ruined irrigation channels for their crops. As
they felt BP and government were not listening to their concerns, they decided
to blockade the highway to their village. According to one resident, the police
badly beat everyone protesting, including children.
Some people
have lost much more than their freedom of assembly – they have lost the safety
of their homes and land that is part of their livelihood due to pipeline
construction and its security corridor. A quarter of the way into their journey
an Azeri villager tells his story. During pipeline construction, a 40m wide
trench was dug, the topsoil removed, and for several years until construction
was completed farmers were unable to use their fields. They were meant to
receive about $4000, roughly a year’s salary, but the system was not carefully
administered by BP. Some families received compensation, while others did not,
or the wrong people did. Similar stories arise at all points along the
pipeline, with BP refusing to deal with the issues, claiming it was actually
the local authority’s fault. In a small Georgian village further along, people
are separated from pastures, forests and hot springs they have used for
generation by armed government troops charged with protecting BP’s
infrastructure.
Security
along the pipeline is another feature of the “Contract of the Century”. Host
Country Agreements outline the expectations of BP and show the weakness of the
bargaining position of the three countries, all of which are responsible for
defending the length of the pipeline using its own military forces. In
Azerbaijan, this meant cutbacks to social services, agriculture and transport
as funding the police and army take up close to 20% of the country’s yearly
budget. In Georgia, a transit country for the pipeline, it means nearly a
quarter of its budget is spent guarding a pipeline from which it receives no
economic benefits.
The Host
Government Agreements also contain evidence of how oil companies such as BP
have been able to negotiate their way into situations where they are
essentially above the law. In Georgia, the preferred pipeline pathway was to
come uncomfortably close to Borjomi National Park, from whose rivers the famous
Borjomi mineral water is bottled and sole, accounting for nearly 10% of Georgia’s
export trade. The Georgian environment minister adamantly refused to sign off
on the pipeline route until she was escorted late one evening to the
president’s office and after several hours admitted that she had signed off on
the route, explaining that pressure came from the company BP and was directed
not just on her but to the president as well. Host Government Agreements
guarantee freedom of petroleum transit, and as a result host nations gave up
their power to protect their citizens from environmental damage and health
hazards for 50 years. The agreements override all existing and future laws
because the foreign companies want confidence.
The Oil Road
brilliantly sums up the folly of a system bent on exploiting nations for
profit, letting people live in poverty while millions of dollars in oil flows
underground to far away markets. There are few books that have done as good a
job at showing the links between companies and national governments, and
providing all the evidence needed to continue the struggle against allowing
this to continue. With many oil pipeline projects presently in negotiation,
this is an important book for activists. While the authors do not put forward
an alternative to this system, they certainly do not fail to provide motivation
for the search.
An edited version of this review was previously published in Socialist Review magazine http://www.socialistreview.org.uk
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