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Friday, September 15, 2023

Syria Warns the US: "Stop the Oil and Gas Robbery! Get Out Immediately!"

The United States tries to overthrow Syrian governments through different proxies like Israel and the Muslim Brotherhood since the 1970ies, and since 2011 through al-Qaeda, Jabhat al-Nusra, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, more radical Jihadi terrorists and militias as well as through substantial US military forces inside of Syria. As a consequence more than half of Syria's population of 23 million is displaced from their homes, 5.5 million fled the country, and estimates of the total number of deaths, in what is framed as 'the Syrian civil war' by the West, vary between 603,064 and about 620,000 as of August 2023. 
 
On September 10, 2023 the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent a letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres and the President of the Security Council Ferit Hoxha, demanding that they put an end to aggressive practices and violations of the principles of international law and the provisions of the UN Charter, which are being committed by the United States of America and its military forces that are illegally present on one third of the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic - on more than sixty thousand square kilometers - in the northeast and in the Al-Tanf region in the southeast of the country (yellowish and light green on the map below). 
 
The Ministry pointed out that the United States of America and its tools continue to violate sovereignty and plunder the country’s wealth and strategic resources, with the aim of exacerbating the effects of illegal unilateral coercive measures and depriving Syrians of the capabilities of their homeland and increasing their suffering. The Ministry added that the value of the damage caused to the Syrian oil and mineral wealth sector as a result of acts of aggression, looting and sabotage committed by the US forces and their terrorist tools amounted to a total of $ 115.2 billion during the period from 2011 until the end of the first half of the year 2023. The Ministry stated that the latest statistics and estimates of the losses of the oil sector in Syria show that the value of direct losses amounted to $ 27.5 billion, resulting from the following: The theft, waste and burning of extracted oil quantities estimated at 341 million barrels. The rate of theft was around 100-130 thousand barrels per day and recently reached 150 thousand barrels per day in addition to 59.9 million cubic meters of natural gas and 413 thousand tons of domestic gas. The value is $21.4 billion. Vandalism and theft of facilities, resulting in damages amounting to $ 3.2 billion. 
 
Dana Stroul, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East, US-Department of Defense, October 2019:
"The US now owns one third of Syria, all of the hidrocarbons, and the country's food basket. The rest is rubble."

The so-called ‘international coalition’ bombed oil and gas facilities in Syria, with the amount of damage amounting to $2.9 billion. The Ministry continued that the indirect losses amount to $87.7 billion, which represents the value of the lost benefits (from crude oil, natural gas, and domestic gas) as a result of a decrease in production below the planned rates under normal working conditions. Syria demanded that American officials be held accountable for these thefts and that the American administration be forced to compensate for them, end the illegal presence of American forces, and return the lands it occupies, oil and gas fields and other natural resources to the Syrian state to ensure improving the humanitarian and living conditions of the Syrians.

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