Wednesday 29 June saw the meeting of two groups of corporate pirates at the Paddington Hilton Hotel....
Inside of the hotel the Iraq Petroleum Conference 2005 was getting underway. This is a two-day gab fest attended by oil executives and technical staff from the Iraqi Oil Ministry as well as from Western major oil corporations. The conference is sponsored by, inter alia, BP and takes place in the context of continuing moves from occupying powers in Iraq to privatise the Iraqi oil industry. On the outside of the conference were an entirely different group of Corporate Pirates. Dressed in full pirate paraphenalia they sailed into Paddington in a giant pirate galleon. Armed with cutlasses, treaure chests and free-market-maps of Iraq they were here to show the conference in its true colours - an act of corporate piracy. Singing pirate shanties and banging drums they called on the surrounding general public to join them in their opposition to the conference inside. The urgency of the call to action was made clear as one speaker from the pirate group outlined how, last month in Iraq, the General Union of Oil Employees held a historic conference in Basra against the privatisation of Iraq's public sector. The Union states in its final conference communiqué: ‘[Iraq] lacks a stable political infrastructure and a clearly defined economic system on which the people can rely. This being so, the conference participants believe that the privatisation of the oil and industrial sectors, or of any part of them, will do great harm to the Iraqi people and their economy’. In solidarity with Iraqis and their right to determine for themselves the future composition of their economy, the Corporate Pirates group is calling for No privatisation; No asset stripping; No expatriation of profits!. Earlier in the day two of the pirates group managed to take this message inside the Hilton Hotel, unfurling a banner which read "Iraq's oil belongs to Iraq's people." They managed to read out the following statement inside the hotel before they were dragged out by security: We are here to show solidarity with the large sections of Iraqi Civil Society who are opposed to any attempted privatisation of their natural resources, which would take much needed profits for reconstruction and development away from Iraqis and into the hands of fat cat corporate executives. We support the General Union of Oil Employees who last month held a historic anti-privatisation conference in Basra. As the illegal occupation of Iraq continues and Iraqis continue to suffer withoug clean water, electricity or food it is curcial that Iraq's national resources are not used to line the pockets of multinational oil companies. As the attention of activists turns North to the G8 in Scotland it is essential that the people of Iraq are remembered. As the corporate plunder of Iraq continues to ravage that country we must call to account the leaders of the G8 nations. At every turn they marshal their military and economic might to defend the economic injustices which they have set up and which conferences like the one in Paddington seek to exploit.
