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Gold/Mining/Energy : TLM.TSE Talisman Energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LARRY LARSON who wrote (1190)	4/11/2001 6:18:44 PM
From: Tomas	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1713

Talisman issues social responsibility report on Sudan - Globe and Mail, April 10 By TERRY WEBER Talisman Energy Inc. — often criticized for its controversial investment in Sudan — issued a report Tuesday defending its stake in the war-torn country and said its involvement in brings employment, training and economic development to the nation. In its first report on corporate social responsibility, Calgary-based Talisman called the African nation "a poor country in need of economic development" and said its holdings in the area help address that deficit. "We hope this report will be received as an honest effort to respond to concerns about our investment in Sudan," Jim Buckee, Talisman's president and chief executive, said in a statement. "In preparing this report and having it independently verified, we believe we have provided an accurate and balanced picture of what we have done in terms of social responsibility and what we are trying to do in Sudan." Tuesday's report is the first issued under the International Code of Ethics for Canadian Business, which was drawn up in 1997. Talisman adopted the code in late 1999 amid growing public criticism of its investment in Sudan, a notorious human-rights offender that has a long-running civil war and against which there have been allegations of slavery and genocide. A Canadian government investigation of Talisman's oil operations released last year said the company should stay in Sudan but be forced to live up to its human-rights obligations. Talisman was one of more than a dozen companies at that time to have agreed to follow the code of ethics, which contains a mixture of substantive, but vague, commitments as well as statements such as "confrontation should be tempered by diplomacy" and "the business sector should show ethical leadership." Despite Tuesday's report, a delegation of Canadian church leaders still called for an internationally co-ordinated withdrawal of foreign development in Sudan until a peace treaty is signed to end the country's 18-year-old civil war. Rev. Bill Phipps, former moderator of the United Church of Canada, told Canadian Press that oil revenues from companies like Talisman are fuelling a brutal war and "the calculated slaughter of defenceless people being driven from their land. "It boggles the mind, the heart and common-sense morality that we allow such behaviour to continue," said Rev. Phipps. "Canada and the international community [must] declare a moratorium on all aspects of oil development in Sudan, including Talisman operations." The moratorium should include exploration, construction, drilling, extraction and sale of oil "until a just peace has been negotiated, beginning with a verifiable cessation of hostilities." In a statement, Talisman said its report — which sets out its definition of corporate responsibility and lists the objectives achieved last year — was independently verified by PricewaterhouseCoopers. That process included visits to Khartoum, a village along its pipeline and interviews with non-governmental organizations in Nairobi that operate in Sudan. "We believe our actions meet with the standards set in the International Code of Ethics for Canadian Business," the company said in a release. "We also believe that we are helping the people of Sudan by providing employment and skills training, building local infrastructure, supporting further economic development and by doing what we can to support peace and stability in the region." As part of its responsibility, Talisman said it will continue to advocate peace in the region and fair distribution of oil revenue. As well, it said, it will also continue to ask all sides of the conflict to respect the rights of the civilian population. Talisman Energy's Talisman (Greater Nile) B.V. unit owns a 25 per cent stake in the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Co. Ltd. Other partners are China National Petroleum Corp., Malaysian-owned Petronas and Sudapet Ltd., the national petroleum company of Sudan. Talisman's share of oil production from the project accounted for 11 per cent of its worldwide production last year.