An Oil-Slicked Playing Field

by DILIP HIRO

[posted online on November 21, 2005]

Despite the likely prospect of Iran being referred to the United Nations Security Council for its noncompliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty by International Atomic Energy Agency governors at their November 24 meeting, its leaders do not appear overly concerned, at least not in public.

They feel that they have a fighting chance of dissuading India, a rising international power, from repeating its performance at the last IAEA meeting in September, when it voted with America and European Union members against Tehran. The Iranians' bargaining chip is the proposed $22 billion supply of Iranian natural gas to India for the next quarter-century. Between now and 2025, the imports of hydrocarbon energy required by a rapidly industrializing India will rise from 70 percent to 85 percent.

This is just the latest instance of how a scramble for petroleum by developing countries worldwide is reshaping the global geopolitics in favor of oil-rich nations.