G8 news

Oil firm pays bribes shock

The British government is backing oil firm Halliburton, the oil services group once led by US vice-president Dick Cheney, despite it being under investigation for bribery and corruption, according to the Guardian. Halliburton’s British arm, Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) are alleged to have paid $180 million in bribes to Nigerian officials over a large gas plant, after receiving $10million in loan guarantees from the Department of Trade and Industry. They have admitted that payments had been made to officials by a British lawyer who paid the money into Swiss bank accounts.

At the G8 summit Brown and Blair will be demanding that African governments take action against corruption while at the same time they are backing companies who are behind that corruption. They are now providing KBR with a $10 million loan guarantee for an oil field deal in Kazakhstan.