The British newspaper The Independent reports today that "secret meetings" have been held by finance ministers and central bank governors in Russia, China, Japan and Brazil to work on a plan pushed by Gulf Arab states to stop using dollars for oil trading.
France is also involved in the alleged scheme, the paper says.
Reporter Robert Fisk, a veteran Middle East correspondent for 30 years and one of the few Western journalists to interview Osama bin Laden, says these states will be moving instead to a basket of currencies include the Japanese yen, Chinese yuan, the euro, gold and a new unified currency for key Arab Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and Qatar.
Fisk, who lives in Beirut, writes that the plans were confirmed to The Independent by both Gulf Arab and Chinese banking sources in Hong Kong.
He says the plan is for a " extraordinary transition" from dollar markets within nine years.
The report says the Americans are aware that these meetings have taken place, but have not discovered the details, and are "sure to fight this international cabal."
Update at 1:15: p.m. ET: The Wall Street Journal reports that Arab officials in the Persian Gulf strongly denied the report. "We have never heard of this or discussed this, not even secretly," Qatar's oil minister Abdullah bin Hamad Al Attiyah told Zawya Dow Jones by telephone.
The AP quotes Kuwait's oil minister, Sheik Ahmed Al Abdullah Al Sabah, as saying there have been no talks on the topic among Gulf oil ministers. "At our level, no," he said. "I didn't even dream about it."
The head of the United Arab Emirates' central bank, Sultan Nasser al-Suweidi, tells the AP that the Gulf nation has no plans to stop pricing oil in dollars. "There has been no meeting ... whatsoever," he tells the news agency, adding that the dollar "will continue as the price for oil."
Meanwhile, the AP says the story is the key factor behind the soaring price of gold which has hit as high as $1,045 an ounce today.
(Photos: Top, Saudi oil installation by Bilal Qabalan, AFP; right, Dubai skyline by Kamran Jebreili, AP
Nessun commento:
Posta un commento