ON JULY 4th, 30 Royal Marines boarded the Iranian oil tanker Grace 1 off Gibraltar, allegedly on orders from the USA, because of suspicions the tanker was transporting oil to Syria. That action began the current crisis which has seen the Iranians seize a British flagged oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz in response, and seen plans emerge for a US and EU naval fleet to police the Gulf area – apart from seizing the British flagged vessel, Iran has also shot down a US drone.
The British and US actions have stepped up war tensions in the Gulf. Now it appears that all the UK was doing was protecting the rear of US and UK oil thieves who are busy looting Syria’s oil fields.
Colonel General Sergei Rudskoy, the chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, has revealed that American military forces have taken over the illegal oil trade in war-torn Syria from the ISIS extremists.
He said in a press conference in Moscow on Monday that US private military companies, numbering over 3,500 personnel, are plundering Syrian oil facilities under the cover of the US-UK-led coalition which is purportedly fighting Daesh Takfiri terrorist groups.
He said: ‘Aside from training militants, the US entities in Syria are involved in plundering oil facilities and deposits in the area across the Euphrates that belong to the legitimate Syrian government.’
The senior Russian general further noted that US military companies are involved in the illegal production and sale of Syrian crude oil from the al-Omar, Conoco and al-Tanak fields. ‘A criminal scheme of Syrian crude cross-border deliveries is in effect. Actually, Syrian national wealth is being plundered.
‘All this activity by US private military companies is conducted under the cover of the international anti-terror coalition. In actual fact, this is a big smuggling business seized by the Americans from Daesh,’ the Russian general said.
Once again, all that the British operation which seized the Grace 1 was designed to do was to protect the rear of these UK and US oil thieves in Syria.
Rudskoy then accused the United States of providing various Arab and Kurdish militia groups in northern Syria with different kinds of ammunition in exchange for assistance in the illegal trafficking of Syrian oil to the eastern bank of the Euphrates River.
Back in March 2018, the United States began the construction of a large military base in Syria’s eastern and oil-rich Dayr al-Zawr province.
‘Specifically, the US military structures have organised the production and sale of Syrian oil from the Conaco, al-Omar and Tanak oilfields located east of the Euphrates River,’ the Russian general stressed again – ‘actually, Syrian national wealth is being plundered.’
A considerable part of the revenues from the hydrocarbon smuggling is spent on maintaining illegal armed formations, bribing sheikhs of tribal unions and instigating anti-government sentiments, according to the Russian general’s data.
‘All this activity by US private military companies is conducted under the cover of the international anti-terror coalition’s aviation. In actual fact, this is a smuggling business seized by the Americans from ISIS,’ Rudskoy explained.
The US incessant deliveries of armament and military hardware to the area across the Euphrates also cause concern, the Russian general added.
‘In exchange for assistance in oil smuggling, the United States is beefing up both Kurdish and Arab formations with arms and they subsequently use them against each other,’ Rudskoy said, adding that ‘all these factors are only exacerbating the situation in the war-torn region.’
He concluded: ‘Within the 55-km zone around al-Tanf, US instructors are training a large armed formation, Magavir al-Saura, and some small militant groups for the so-called Army of Arab Tribes.’
US and UK workers must support the Syrian government’s demands that all US-UK forces are withdrawn from Syria and that all of Syria’s occupied territories be returned to it, from the Israel occupied Golan Heights to the US-UK occupied Al-Tanf area.
