ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

A four-part series that reveals how a secret pact formed a cartel that controls the world's oil. On August 28, 1928, in the Scottish highlands, began the secret story of oil. Three men had an appointment at Achnacarry Castle - a Dutchman, an American and an Englishman. The Dutchman was Henry Deterding, a man nicknamed the Napoleon of Oil, having exploited a find in Sumatra. He joined forces with a rich ship owner and painted Shell salesman and together the two men founded Royal Dutch Shell. The American was Walter C. Teagle and he represents the Standard Oil Company, founded by John D. Rockefeller at the age of 31 - the future Exxon. Oil wells, transport, refining and distribution of oil - everything is controlled by Standard oil. The Englishman, Sir John Cadman, was the director of the Anglo-Persian oil Company, soon to become BP. On the initiative of a young Winston Churchill, the British government had taken a stake in BP and the Royal Navy switched its fuel from coal to oil. ...

At least 20 vehicles loaded with anti-aircraft guns block road as 200 armed men demand removal of Gaddafi-era staff. Armed men have surrounded Libya's foreign ministry in the capital, Tripoli, to push demands that officials who had worked for deposed leader Muammar Gaddafi's government be banned from senior positions in the new administration. At least 20 pickup vehicles loaded with anti-aircraft guns blocked the roads on Sunday, while men armed with AK-47s and sniper rifles directed the traffic away from the building, witnesses said. Esaam al-Naas, a Libyan military official, said there were at least 200 armed men surrounding the ministry building. He said negotiations with the protesters were under way and that no one had entered the building. Ali Zeidan, Libyan prime minister, said armed groups also tried to storm the ministry of interior and a state news agency on Sunday. Zeidan urged people to help the government in resisting such armed groups. "There are people who...

(Reuters) - Tens of millions of U.S. dollars in cash were delivered by the CIA in suitcases, backpacks and plastic shopping bags to the office of Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai for more than a decade, according to the New York Times , citing current and former advisers to the Afghan leader. The so-called "ghost money" was meant to buy influence for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) but instead fuelled corruption and empowered warlords, undermining Washington's exit strategy from Afghanistan, the newspaper quoted U.S. officials as saying. "The biggest source of corruption in Afghanistan", one American official said, "was the United States." The CIA declined to comment on the report and the U.S. State Department did not immediately comment. The New York Times did not publish any comment from Karzai or his office. "We called it ‘ghost money'," Khalil Roman, who served as Karzai's chief of staff from 2002 until 2005, told t...