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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (246429)	10/24/2007 3:04:56 AM
From: Wharf Rat	Respond to of 281500

OPEC Takes Ecuador Back As Active Member - Energy Min QUITO -(Dow Jones)- The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries has accepted Ecuador back as an active member, Energy Minister Galo Chiriboga told Dow Jones Newswires Tuesday. OPEC sent a letter to Ecuadorean authorities dated Oct. 23, two weeks after the Andean country officially asked to regain its active membership status, he said. "We'll do everything necessary to be at the November meeting in Saudi Arabia as active members," Chiriboga said. OPEC countries' heads-of-state meet Nov. 17 in Saudi Arabia, and Ecuador's President Rafael Correa has said he wants to participate. Alejandro Fuentes, a deputy minister at the Mines and Energy Ministry, said Chiriboga and others will travel to the OPEC headquarters in Vienna to make sure all legal requirements are met. Chief among those requirements is the payment of about $5 millionEcuador owes in OPEC dues. Ecuador stopped paying dues in 1992, although it never formally quit the organization. Fuentes added Chiriboga will also meet with investors and members of the press "to clarify to the world" the government's decision to require oil companies to hand over extra revenues when oil prices rise above average prices laid down in operating contracts. That "is not confiscation," he said. Earlier this month, the government increased its oil shares to 99% from 50%. Ecuador is a marginal oil producer, with 507,000 barrels a day in private and state production. The Correa administration has said several times it wants to rejoin OPEC for strategic reasons, ranging from technology support to access to loans from other member countries. -By Mercedes Alvaro, Dow Jones Newswires; 5939-9728-653; mercedes.alvaro@ dowjones.com news.nasdaq.com