Dubai ports takeover prompts backlash

Main page content: Dubai ports takeover prompts backlash By Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Edward Alden in Washington Published: February 16 2006 23:00 | Last updated: February 16 2006 23:00

Washington lawmakers on Thursday expressed deep reservations about Dubai Ports World’s £3.9bn acquisition of P&O, the UK-based port operator, on the grounds that the deal represented a potential national security threat, and demanded that the White House re-open a regulatory review of the deal. ADVERTISEMENT

In a letter to Treasury secretary John Snow, Senator Richard Shelby, an influential Alabama Republican, stopped short of calling for the deal to be blocked, but said the transaction merited further scrutiny, potentially raising complications for DP World’s bid. Mr Shelby is expected to call for a hearing to discuss the issue in coming weeks.

In a separate letter to Mr Snow, New York senator Chuck Schumer and others said US ports were “the most vulnerable targets for terrorist attack”. They questioned whether DP World, which is owned and controlled by Dubai, should be allowed to take over P&O, charging that Dubai was a “key transfer point” for shipments of nuclear components bound for Iran, North Korea and Libya.

The deal, which has already been given regulatory clearance by the White House, gives DP World container terminals at six ports on the east coast of the US, including New York and New Jersey.

Although the Department of Homeland Security is ultimately charged with cargo- screening functions, the legislators said the port facility itself was responsible for securing cargo coming in and out of the port and the hiring of security personnel.

After the 9/11 attacks, your department complained of a lack of co-operation by the UAE and other Arab countries as the US was trying to track down Osama bin Laden’s bank accounts,” the letter stipulated.

The growing congressional backlash against the deal is likely to reignite a debate in Washington on the effectiveness of the committee on foreign investments in the US, or Cfius, an inter-agency panel that vets foreign takeovers of US assets on national security grounds.

Cfius, which is chaired by the Treasury Department, approved Dubai’s bid for P&O after reviewing it for a standard 30-day-period, although the committee could have called for the deal to be examined more thoroughly over an additional 45 days.

Stewart Baker, assistant secretary for policy in the Department of Homeland Security, said that Cfius had completed its review after it was notified last year of the pending takeover, and had concluded there was no national security basis for blocking the transaction.

He said the US government had worked cooperatively with DP World in the past as part of the global container security initiative launched by the US after the September 11 attacks.

People familiar with the deal said administration officials were yesterday briefing lawmakers on the deal to assuage their concerns.

A spokesperson for the Treasury Department said the administration would not re-open its review unless evidence emerged that DP World had given the committee false information.

Cfius came under harsh scrutiny by lawmakers last year following a failed attempt by CNOOC, the Chinese oil company, to takeover California-based Unocal. Although the deal was quashed before Cfius reviewed the transaction, the widespread opposition to the deal in Congress prompted the Treasury Department and other agencies to promise to increase transparency at Cfius by communicating more with Congress and to be more willing to conduct full investigations of deals.

So who is being the liar now.

YOU!

Do you ACTUALLY believe that Multi-Billion dollar deals with Multi-National Companies MAGICALLY occur AFTER certain players are bought by one of the interested parties? That they ONLY take one year?

Just how long does a Billion dollar deal take, Dane?

Because I'd bet that this buyout was proposed, started, researched, and negotiated when Snow was still head of CSX!

But not in your Kool-Aid addled world! Multi-National deals and Billion dollar buyouts ONLY occur when GWB and his sock-puppets say they do!

Wow, you really do NOT have a clue of what you speak...

http://webnewsroom.blogspot.com/2006/02/re-portgate.html

For once, Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) is right about something. I guess it just goes to show that even a blind bird catches a worm once in a while.

What Schumer is right about is his opposition to the deal that would allow Dubai Ports World, a company based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), to gain control of six major American ports through its purchase of London-based Peninsular and Oriental Staem Navigation Company, which currently runs the ports: New York, Newark, Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans, and Miami.

The obvious question is, aren't there any American companies capable of running these ports? And the more important question is, Are we serious about the War on Terror? We have left our borders wide open for anyone (including terrorists) to come through and now we are turning control of six major ports over to a country that sponsors terrorism.

The deal has been approved by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, but Schumer, along with Senators Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Representaties Vito Fossella (R-NY), Christopher Shays (R-Ct.), and Mark Foley (R-Fla.), is trying to stop the transaction. REpresentaigve Peter King (R-NY), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, has urged the Bush Administration to reconsider.

New York City Council members of both parties have spoken out against the deal. "On its face, this looks like insanity to me," the Republican minority leader of the City Council, James Oddo, said. The chairman of the Council's Public Safety Committee, Democrat Peter Vallone, said that the deal "raises some legitimate concerns."

The Bush administration considers the UAE a key ally in the War on Terror, but the UAE has been a sponsor of terrorism. It was the home of Marwan al-Shehi, one of the 19 hijackers who killed 3,000 people on September 11, 2001. Other hijackers travelled through the UAE. The UAE was an important financial base for the September 11 hijackers. The country is a transit point for Al Qaeda. It has been a financier of Al Qaeda. It continues to regard the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan and is militantly anti-Israel. The CIA has identified the UAE as a major center for drug running and money laundering. It also has close ties to Iran.

The UAE is a federation of seven Arab emirates on the Arabian peninsula.

As Rep. Foley has said, "If our ports are the most vulnerable targets for terrorism and if we are at war, as the president says, we should be overly critical of handing over the management of our ports to any foreign countries, post 9/11."

What happens if nuclear materials pass through one of these ports? How will the UAE direct its employees to deal with that? The threat to our national security is clear.

That is why these Senators and Representatives are right to speak out against the transfer of control of our ports to UAE control, just as Red Chinese control of the Panama Canal poses a threat to our national security.

Can we afford to turn control of key ports over to a company controlled by a terrorist-sponsoring government?

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