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An attempt to keep Iraq together as one nation even as it splinters into 3 with the Kurdish north and the Shiite south containing all the oil fields, by having a oil council at the central government which work with oil governmental organizations in the Kurdish north and one similiar to be setup in the Shiite south. Does it give Sunnis some hope for a share in the revenues and incentive to work within a national framework which increasingly is agoal only of the US and Britain only and possibly only given lip service by the elected government as the mostly Shiite government also prepares in the background to US presence for an eventual partitioning of the country. Remember many of the Arab states were creations of he British and French empires in the 20th century, and not necessarily natural divisions. Culturally and by religious beliefs parts of Iraq that are Shiite are brethren to western Afghanistan round kandahar and to the Shiite centres of religion ad culture in Iran, and have been so for centuries before Europeans had a presence here in the 19th and 20th centuries, and this won't simply go away especially when the post war modernization that occurred in Iraq whatever its appearance was of the worst type that exacerbated religious tension and did not bring communities together....

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India has reduced imports of oil from Iran from 12% in 2011 to about 9% by the end of April, 2012. A senior state department official from the U.S., Carlos Pascual, will be in India in mid May 2012 to assess the energy situation and see what specific energy facilities in India need to do. Some of the refineries in India are designed to handle only the kind of heavy oil Iran supplies. For the U.S. the issue is keeping up the pressure on Iran during the talks in Istanbul, Turkey, on Iran's nuclear program. For India it has the vital trade and economic relationship with the U.S. balanced against cultural ties to the region and the need for oil supplies.

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Petrobras plans a public offering of shares in September 2010 to raise money for a capital increase. This will finance its large offshore drilling investment plans.

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Energy Aspects, London based consultancy, estimates non-OPEC production declines of 700,000 barrels a day, up from previous forecasts of 200,000-300,000 barrels a day. Demand is expected to be higher than supply by June 2016, and drawing down inventory from that time. Agreement to freeze production is uncertain at a Doha meeting of OPEC countries, with Iran planning to increase production from 3.1 million barrels a day currently to 4 million barrels a day. Saudis increased production to 10 million barrels a day in 2015, and Iran is determined to increase its production to the higher level. The price of U.S. oil rebounded to $42.17 by April 2016.

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Luis Videgaray, MIT trained economist, is the closest economic advisor to Mexico's presidential candidate, Enrique Pena Nieto. Mexico's presidential elections will be held in July 2012.

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Mexico's Congress passes changes to the constitution and new oil legislation which will allow foreign companies to compete with state owned Pemex. Challenges remain in the form of creating transparent regulators to implement the legislation, and ensuring that the benefits of the increased investment in the oil industry benefit ordinary Mexicans through a higher growth rate, using cheaper natural gas to support the manufacturing sector, and additional revenues from the increased oil and gas production tha support health, education and infrastructure development.

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Baker and Erlanger describe Russian president Putin's effort to finance parties on the right and the left to oppose western sanctions on Russia. The effort by Russian television RT to spread disinformation in the European Union. The goal is to create fractures in European unity and weaken the European Union and NATO. Other experts such as former national intelligence officer, Fiona Hill, and former assistant secretary of state, David Kramer, are skeptical about the effectiveness of these methods. These methods may also come from an old book of methods from the Cold War period because of president Putin's experience in Dresden during the Soviet days, which current European Union leaders would see as having little relevance to the global economy and global scene of today. The rise of the smaller parties in Europe in opposition to the traditional parties has more to do with the difficult economic conditions in Europe, and has little in common with Russia and its problems with its oil dependent economy and its interests in Eastern Europe. As the 2015 Pew Research survey on Europe shows, opinion is shifting towards greater support for the European Union as economic conditions improve, and is likely to move further in this direction with a return to economic growth. Favorable views of the EU which dropped from 60% in 2012 to 53% in 2014, was up to 61% in 2015, according to the survey. The Euroskeptic parties are viewed "as a good thing," as a way to shake up the complacency of the major ruling parties in tackling the economy, according to the Pew Europe Survey. In the percentage of people who see the Euroskeptic parties as a good thing for the country- Podemos left party in Spain gets 70% favorable rating, UK Independence Party 66% favorable, Five Star Movement in Italy 58%, AfD in Germany 50%, and much less so in France with 36% saying this for the National Front, and 36% for the New Right in Poland....

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The failure to reach an agreement between the U.S. Justice Department and BP over liability in the Gulf Oil Spill. The Justice Department says BP was grossly negligent in the spill. BP's position is that responsibility was shared with Transocean, Halliburton and other companies, so that BP by itself was not grossly negligent. The case now goes to trial.