"Where's Jeb?" said George W.

"You'd think while I'm down in Florida he'd come and visit"


US oil firms get little play at Bush-Putin meeting - Yahoo! News

ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) -
President George W. Bush' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> President George W. Bush did not press the case during almost two hours of private talks on Saturday with Russian President Vladimir that a U.S. company should be selected to help develop a giant Russian natural gas field, Bush's national security adviser said.
Putin has made energy security a major theme at this weekend's meeting of the Group of Eight (G8) rich nations in St Petersburg, and U.S. companies are hoping Bush will push Putin to open more of Russia's oil and gas sector to investment.
In particular, U.S.-based ConocoPhillips and Chevron are competing with three other foreign energy firms to be picked to partner Russian energy giant Gazprom to develop the prized Shtokman gas field in the Barents Sea.
Bush and Putin held a private meeting for almost two hours on Saturday morning before the official start of the G8.
While many issues were discussed, energy was not a major topic and the president skipped the opportunity altogether to promote a U.S. energy company for developing the Shtokman field, according to National Security Adviser
Stephen Hadley' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> Stephen Hadley.
"It didn't figure largely in their discussions today (and) that particular (Shtokman) case did not come up," he told reporters during a briefing on the talks.
Hadley said energy issues were scheduled to be discussed later by the G8 leaders at the summit. However, energy is now seen as a minor issue in order to deal with more urgent matters like new fighting in the Middle East,
Iran' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> Iran's nuclear program and
North Korea' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> North Korea's test firing of missiles.
"NO WTO LINKAGE"
Some energy experts have suggested a U.S. company would not likely be picked to develop the Shtokman field unless the United States works out its differences with Russia joining the
World Trade Organization' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> World Trade Organization.
After several days of intense negotiations this week, U.S. and Russian officials were unable to reach a WTO deal in time for the G8 summit.
Other experts argue that it would be in Russia's interest to pick a U.S. partner since Gazprom wants to super-cool Shtokman's gas into liquefied natural gas (LNG) and ship it to America.
Also, it would be easier for Gazprom to buy a stake, without much opposition from Congress, in a U.S. LNG import terminal if an American firm was involved in Shtokman, they say.
The other hopefuls competing for a part of Shtokman, one of the world's biggest but most technically challenging gas fields, are France's Total and Norwegian firms Statoil and Norsk Hydro.
Both Hadley and U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab said they did not believe the decision on Stockman would be linked to the United States backing Russia's accession to the WTO.
"I can say for the policy side that there has been no linkage of any other issue to the WTO succession agreement (with Russia)," Hadley said.
"These trade agreements...are done by the book on the merits, with an eye toward what works and will get accepted by the Congress. And that's how it should be," he said.
USTR Schwab agreed, saying: "There has no been no tie between the negotiations of (Russia's) WTO accession agreement and any other issue."