21 Feb 2011

Woodside: despite the sell-offs chief executive Don Voelte maintains relations are still good between the two companies

Anglo-Dutch oil giant Royal Dutch Shell is in talks with Woodside Petroleum about what it plans to do with its remaining 24% stake in the company after catching Australia‘s largest oil and gas producer on the hop last November when it sold off a big chunk of the company.

Shell sold a £1.67 billion stake – equivalent to a third of its holding, last year, reportedly angering Woodside‘s board and triggering speculation that Woodside could fall to a takeover.

“The chairman and I are working very constructively and professionally with them,” Woodside chief executive Don Voelte said, playing down talk of bad relations between the companies.

“I can’t go too far on this, it’s early days. I’ll just say that I would hope that we’re not surprised with the other 24 percent,” he said.

“I would say we’re proactive. I think we’re doing the right things right now.”

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Chika Amanze-Nwachuku: 8 February 2011

A United States Appeal Court on Friday refused to entertain a lawsuit that accused Royal Dutch Shell Plc of helping Nigerian authorities violently to suppress protests against oil exploration in the 1990s.

Specifically, the plaintiffs, families of seven Ogoni indigenes who were executed by the regime of the late General Sani Abacha, had accused the oil giant of violations related to the 1995 hangings of Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other protesters by Nigeria’s then-military government.

In the case – Kiobel et al v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co et al, 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Nos. 06-4800 and 06-4876, the plaintiffs had sought their claims from the oil giant under a 1789 U.S. law known as the Alien Tort Statute.

The Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA) was adopted in 1789 as part of the original Judiciary Act. It gave the federal courts jurisdiction to hear tort claims brought by foreigners who allege a violation of international law or a treaty to which the United States is a party. For almost two centuries, the statute was relatively dormant, supporting jurisdiction in only a handful of cases. However, it was later invoked in several cases involving torture, disappearances, or killings committed by non-Americans in foreign countries.

In a divided vote that prompted a bitter debate among some of its judges, the US appellate court affirmed a September ruling, which held that companies cannot be liable in U.S. courts for violations of international human rights law.

Reuters reported that the full 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York declined to hear the case by a 5-5 vote and instead left intact the original 2-1 panel ruling from September. Separately, the judges in that panel voted 2-1 not to rehear the case, the report said, added that the Friday ruling may not be the end of the lawsuit.

“The 2nd Circuit is alone among federal circuit courts in concluding that corporations cannot be responsible under U.S. law for human rights violations, ” the newswire quoted an international law professor at George Washington University, Ralph Steinhardt as saying. “This clears the way for the plaintiffs to seek review at the Supreme Court,” he added. The report added that a lawyer who has represented the families, Paul Hoffman, and Shell, did not immediately return requests for comment.

Shell had since denied allegations it is involved in human rights abuses.The 2nd Circuit ruling, the report said, applies in New York, Connecticut and Vermont. The Alien Tort Statute had underpinned other human rights cases. Reuters reported that in one, mining company Rio Tinto Plc was accused of forcing workers in Papua New Guinea to live in “slave like” conditions, and pushing the government to exact retribution after a mine was sabotaged.

The report cited another case where plaintiffs sought to hold Ford Motor Co. General Motors Co. and International Business Machines Corp liable for helping South African authorities when apartheid was in force more than two decades ago.

Friday’s split ruling showed major differences in the judges’ thinking. Chief Judge Dennis Jacobs, part of the September panel that ruled for Shell, wrote that the original ruling “has no great practical effect except for the considerable benefit of avoiding abuse of the courts to extort settlements.”

He chided what he called fears by dissenting Judge Pierre Leval that “slavers and pirates will now rush into corporate transactions,” resulting in “absolution to moral monsters. For the record: even moral monsters are humans, and I would happily see them hanged.” Leval countered that Jacobs’ opinion evinces an “intense, multi-faceted policy agenda” underlying an effort “to exempt corporations from the law of nations.”

The report noted that other judges who favored a rehearing by the entire court said the case presented “a significant issue,” and that September’s ruling conflicted with a 2008 ruling from the 11th Circuit appeals court, which sits in Atlanta.

SOURCE ARTICLE

FT.com

By David Blair in London and Tom Burgis in Mumbai: Published: February 19 2011 01:30

Essar Energy has taken a significant step towards buying Shell’s refinery at Stanlow, on the south bank of the Manchester Ship Canal near Ellesmere Port in Cheshire.

Essar has until March 31 to confirm that it wants to buy Stanlow. If it decides not to proceed, it will be liable for a break fee of $50m. If Essar decides to go ahead, Shell will have three days to decide whether to accept – and it will be liable for a $10m fee if it turns down the offer.

FULL ARTICLE

Feb 19, 2011 2:07 PM GMT+0000

AMSTERDAM (AP) — Royal Dutch Shell PLC has entered into a $1 billion agreement to sell a majority share of most of its downstream businesses in 14 African countries to the Vitol trading company and Helios, an African investment company.

The announcement by the three companies says two joint new ventures will be created. One, to be 80 percent owned by Helios and the Netherlands-based Vitol, will continue supplying the Shell brand of fuels and lubricants in the 14 countries, with five more nations possibly joining later.

A separate company, 50 percent owned by Shell, will operate Shell’s existing lubricants blending plants in seven countries and will manage distributor relationships.

The companies said Saturday the deal is to be completed in phases by the first half of 2012.

Copyright © 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

SOURCE ARTICLE

By John Donovan

Printed below is our most recent correspondence with Royal Dutch Shell Plc.

It is self-explanatory.

From: John Donovan <john@shellnews.net>
Date: 2 February 2011 14:47:14 GMT
To: gavin.white@shell.com
Cc: michiel.brandjes@shell.com
Subject: Section 7 (1) of the Data Protection Act

To:

Mr. Gavin White
Company Secretarial Department
Shell International Limited

Dear Mr. White

Section 7 (1) of the Data Protection Act

As you may be aware, my father Alfred Donovan and I reached an agreement with Royal Dutch Shell Plc Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer, Mr Richard Wiseman, that in future our Subject Access Request applications to Shell would be made on a joint basis i.e. in the names of Alfred and John Donovan.

Bearing in mind that a year has passed since our last application, we formally request that you please send us the information to which we are entitled under section 7 (1) of the Data Protection Act 1998 in relation to our dealings with Shell. This is to include all documents, drafts, reports, emails, communications, correspondence, transcripts and any other information held by Shell, which contain either or both of our names, or abbreviations thereof, or codes which signify our names.

In this connection, we have supplied some background information, which will hopefully assist in locating relevant information. To avoid constantly repeating the formal request and the range of information set out in the above paragraph, please take it that the specified range of information automatically always applies, including whenever we use the term: “We request all relevant information”.

At the time of our last application, just over a year ago, on 13 January 2010 to be precise, we were unaware that Shell had resolved all litigation with Dr John Huong, (aka Dr John Huong Yiu Tuong) the former employee of Shell in Malaysia. We now seek all relevant information in the control or possession of Shell stretching back to and including 2004. We have previously been advised by Shell that you are not obliged to provide SAR information relating to litigation in progress. That situation no longer applies in relation to Dr John Huong. We are aware that RDS Plc head office lawyers were involved in the litigation, which stemmed in the first place from information we published on our website.  A UK registered company was one of the eight companies within the Royal Dutch Shell group that sued Dr Huong for defamation, obtained multiple injunctions against him and sought his imprisonment for alleged contempt of court in respect of further information posted on our website. Since we played the key role, it also seems likely that reference was made to one or both of us and/or our website in the settlement documents.

For many years Mr Richard Wiseman has been the key person at Shell dealing with all matters relating to us. Particular attention should therefore be applied to his files including contact with the news media, matters relating to WikiLeaks, Wikipedia, and matters relating to Shell Oil USA, including the industrial espionage investigation of Shell by U.S. authorities, as authorised by U.S. Defence Department attorneys to be confirmed to us by a high level U.S. Intelligence source. We would also request all relevant information concerning the related former Shell employee whose name will already be known to Shell.

Our first SAR application revealed that a crisis reaction team had been set up to counter our website activities. The content of one email was decidedly hostile towards us. Please supply any further correspondence or documents relating to the same or any subsequent team, third party, or person, involved in any such activities such as industrial espionage and/or hacking on behalf of Shell, perhaps involving Shell Corporate Affairs Security. In this connection we also request all relevant information naming or referring to one of both of us in the possession or control of Shell Global Security. Please also address this request to Mr Ian Forbes McCredie OBE, the former British Secret Service officer who is head of Shell Global Security and Richard T. Garcia, the former senior FBI official of 25 years standing, who is Global Security Advisor for Shell International. We request all relevant information.

Please also supply any relevant Shell correspondence with Saudi Aramco, and/or the Saudi Arabia government/regime, and/or Motiva Enterprises, in which we are referred to or are named. We request all relevant information.

Other matters and events in the last years which may have generated relevant information include the Shell Global Address Book database leaked to us; the Corrib Gas Project controversy, including alleged death threats made to our Shell insider contacts; our supply of Shell insider documents to U.S.federal investigators in relation to the Gale Norton controversy (they approached us); the controversy surrounding Shell’s plans to drill in the Arctic Ocean; the controversy surroundings Shell’s dealings with Nigeria, Libya and Iran; the controversy surrounding Shell’s historical dealings with Hitler and the Nazis.

Basically, we seek all relevant information held by Shell in all departments including PR/media, which has not previously been supplied.

Can you please ensure that we can identity where Shell has redacted information, as this is impossible to do on many documents you have previously supplied. There should always be heavy black lines denoting redaction, not just white spaces. Without such indication, it is sometimes impossible to identify for certain when redaction has taken place, for example at the end of a line of print (where the print margins are not justified) or at the end of a sentence, if there are just blank spaces indistinguishable from the non printed background of the document.

If you need further information from us, or a fee, please let us know as soon as possible.

If you no longer handle these requests for your organisation, please pass this email to your Data Protection Officer or other appropriate officer.

Best Regards

Alfred Donovan and John Donovan

RESPONSE FROM ROYAL DUTCH SHELL PLC 17 FEBRUARY 2011 (PDF)

MAIN TEXT

17 February 2011

Mr John Donovan’s email to myself dated 2 February 2011 requesting information pursuant to section 7 (1) of the Data Protection Act 1998 will be dealt with on behalf of the appropriate companies in the Royal Dutch/Shell Group by Company Secretarial, Shell International Limited.

Please find enclosed two copies of a Subject Access Request form together with an Information Leaflet. The Subject Access Request form is for any Personal Data that any Shell Group Company operating in the UK may be processing apart from images from CCTV equipment. If you want information about or a copy of images from CCTV equipment please ask for a separate Subject Access Request form.

Each of you will need to complete a Subject Access Request form. The Subject Access Request form is divided into two sections:

Part A- asks you to give information about yourself that will help us confirm your identity. You will be asked to provide evidence of your identity by producing documentation with your application. When dealing with a Subject Access Request, the Data Controller has a duty to ensure that information he holds is secure and must be satisfied that you are who you say you are before disclosing the information.

Part B – asks you to declare that the information you have supplied is correct and to confirm that either you are the Data Subject or to confirm your relationship with the Data Subject.  A person who impersonates or attempts to impersonate another may be guilty of an offence.

If you wish to obtain information about Personal Data and a copy of any Personal Data from a Shell Group company operating in the U.K please each complete a Subject Access Request form and return it enclosing the following documentation:

• A copy of an appropriate identification document for each of you;
• Any other authorities requested;
• The fee (or donation if appropriate) of £10 (only one fee of £10 is necessary);

Once we have received the completed forms, together with the appropriate documentation and fee where requested, we will consider the request. Unless certain exemptions apply or we require more information from you to identify the information you are requesting, we will supply you with information and a copy of the Personal Data requested within 40 days of receipt of the completed forms.

Please note that the form enclosed with this letter does not cover images captured on CCTV equipment. If you require information about, or a copy of these images please ask for a separate Subject Access Request form.

Yours faithfully

Gavin White

Shell International Limited

“Second Circuit Leaves Intact Ruling Limiting Jurisdiction of Alien Tort Statute Over Corporations”
Fulbright Briefing
Judith A. Archer and Sarah E. O’Connell
February 16, 2011

On February 4, 2011, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit denied en banc reconsideration of a September ruling in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., holding that the jurisdiction granted by the Alien Tort Statute (“ATS”) does not extend to civil actions brought against corporations. The vote of the full 10-judge panel of the Second Circuit was split 5-5, leaving intact the original ruling from September. The initial panel voted separately not to rehear the case. Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., No. 06-4800-cv, 06-4876-cv, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 2200 (2d Cir. Feb. 4, 2011)

The ATS provides that “[t]he district courts shall have original jurisdiction over any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 1350. While originally the ATS was thought to cover only violations such as the law of safe passage, infringement of the rights of ambassadors and piracy, recently federal courts have seen an increase in the number of ATS filings.

Plaintiffs in recent cases have asserted claims against multinational corporations under the theory that the corporations aided and abetted human rights violations through their cooperation with governments alleged to have engaged in such violations. Nigerian-resident plaintiffs in Kiobel alleged that defendant corporations who engaged in oil exploration and production in Nigeria, aided and abetted the Nigerian government in committing human rights violations directed towards plaintiffs.

The district court dismissed some of plaintiffs claims, but allowed the claims alleging aiding and abetting arbitrary arrest and detention, crimes against humanity and torture, to go forward.

On appeal, the Second Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal, but reversed the portion of the opinion permitting claims to go forward against the corporate defendants. Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 621 F.3d 111 (2d Cir. 2010). The majority opinion, authored by Judge Cabranes and joined by Chief Judge Jacobs, held that customary international law, namely, the universally accepted rules that the nations of the world treat as binding in their dealings with one another, determines the district court’s jurisdiction under the ATS. Because customary international law, the majority held, has been limited from its inception to natural persons rather than “juridical persons” such as corporations, jurisdiction under the ATS does not extend to civil actions brought against corporations.

The Kiobel majority opinion does not limit suits against individual perpetrators of violations of customary international law, including employees and directors of corporations. Judge Leval, concurring only in the result, argued that the majority’s opinion dealt a “substantial blow to international law and its fundamental undertaking to protect fundamental human rights.”

This issue may well end up in the Supreme Court, since the Eleventh Circuit has reached the contrary result from the Second Circuit, holding in two separate opinions that corporations may be held liable under the ATS. Sinaltrainal v. Coca-Cola, 578 F.3d 1252, 1263 (11th Cir. 2009); Romero v. Drummond Co., Inc., 552 F.3d 1303 (11th Cir. 2008).

This article was prepared by Judith A. Archer (jarcher@fulbright.com or 212 318 3342) and Sarah E. O’Connell (soconnell@fulbright.com or 212 318 3093) from Fulbright’s Litigation Practice Group.

SOURCE ARTICLE

Petrol from India is likely to find its way into the UK market for the first time, after Essar Energy bought Royal Dutch Shell’s Cheshire oil refinery for $350m (£216m).

Essar may pump Indian fuel into UK Photo: ALAMY

By Rowena Mason 7:15AM GMT 19 Feb 2011

By Tennille Tracy, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

Feb 18, 2011

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The U.S. House of Representatives has approved a measure that helps clear a path for Royal Dutch Shell (RDSA, RDSA.LN) to drill an exploratory well in the Arctic Ocean.

With most of the favorable votes coming from Republicans, the measure blocks the Environmental Protection Agency’s appeals board from revoking any permits for projects along Alaska’s Arctic Coast.

The goal of the measure, introduced by Alaska Republican Rep. Don Young, is to prevent this appeals board from revoking a clean-air permit Shell is seeking in its effort to drill an exploratory well in the Beaufort Sea.

The measure was added as an amendment to the spending bill the House is developing to finance government operations through the rest of fiscal year 2011.

“I think the Shell permit highlighted the need to remove another layer of bureaucracy,” a spokeswoman for Young said.

-By Tennille Tracy, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6619; tennille.tracy@ dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires
02-18-111448ET
Copyright (c) 2011 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

SOURCE ARTICLE

As one Stanlow insider put it…

“John, Looks like we have been sold by the cowboys to the Indians.”

Shell receives offer for Stanlow refinery in the UK

18/02/2011

Shell today confirmed it has received an offer from Essar Energy to buy its 272,000 barrel-per-day Stanlow refinery and associated local marketing businesses in the UK for a total expected consideration of some $1.3 billion.

Enquiries

Notes to editors

In 2009 Shell confirmed that it was talking to third parties about the potential sale of Stanlow Refinery and associated local marketing businesses.

The offer from Essar covers Oil Products and Chemicals Manufacturing and distribution terminal assets, plus the Commercial Fuels Bulk Fuels and local Marine fuels businesses associated with the Stanlow refinery, but does not include any of Shell’s UK Retail sites, the Shell higher olefins plant and alcohols units, the lubricant oils blending plant, lubricants marketing business, Shell aviation operations at airports, non-local marine business, marine lubricants, commercial road transport marketing businesses, bitumen marketing business or Shell technology centre Thornton.

In the UK, Shell has a network of more than 900 branded retail sites, and supplies and distributes oil products to a range of airport, Lubricants, Marine and Bitumen customers. The company also has upstream operations in the UK sector of the North Sea and 3 onshore gas plants.

SOURCE SHELL WEBPAGE