John Helmer, Mineweb
Russian energy and mining companies are preparing for the visit to Africa early next month of President Vladimir Putin. But the black backdrop of the visit, the first in half a century by a Russian head of state, is the increasingly aggressive reaction of the Bush administration in Washington to the combination of arms and business which the Russians are offering those whom the US considers to belong to its camp.

Daniele Ganser, ISN Security Watch (Switzerland)
Dr. Daniele Ganser is a senior researcher at the Center for Security Studies at the ETH in Zurich.
...Oil supply is less secure than it was 50 years ago. But at the same time, global demand for oil has been skyrocketing with no end in sight, considering the growing oil requirements from rapidly expanding economies such as those of China and India. "The Chinese government is well aware of peak oil," said Pang Xiongqi of the China University of Petroleum in Beijing in July 2005. Being the second largest oil consumer behind the US, the Chinese now consume seven Mm/d - a demand they cannot match by their domestic oil production of only 3.5 Mm/d. And, thus, like many other countries, they must import energy.

Erik Curren, Augusta Free Press
Have you been infected yet? I mean with ethanol mania?

It's not clear yet whether it started with Midwest corn farmers, hippie do-it-yourselfers or Brazilians who swear that ethanol will soon free them from foreign oil. But now it's spread to Washington and Wall Street, and no political persuasion appears to be immune. President Bush, Hillary Clinton, Bill Gates and the traders at Goldman Sachs have all become ethanol maniacs.

Mariam Karouny, The Washington Post
Iraq's new government risks being held to ransom by a dissident Shi'ite faction using its local clout in Basra to hobble vital oil exports, Iraqi officials and senior political sources said on Friday.

They warned that the locally powerful Fadhila party was threatening to have members in the oil industry stage a go-slow to halt exports through the key southern oil port if it did not win the concessions it wanted from Baghdad.

Japan Times
The contract Japanese oil developers signed in 2004 to tap Iran's giant Azadegan oil field could be terminated in September with no major progress in the project, and Iran may strike a new deal with energy-hungry China.

Full Article:
Iran plays China card with Japan on oil deal