US Government Acts as “Mediator” in Mexico’s Lucrative Oil and Gas Privatization
New records obtained by DeSmog shed further light on the role
the U.S.government has played to help implement the privatization of
Mexico’s oil and gas industry, opening it up to international firms
beyond state-owned company PEMEX (Petroleos Mexicanos).
Obtained from both the City of San Antonio, Texas and University of Texas-San Antonio (UTSA), the records center around the U.S.–Mexico Oil and Gas Business Export Conference, held in May in San Antonio and hosted by both the U.S.Department of Trade and Department of Commerce, as well as UTSA.
They reveal the U.S. government acting as a mediator between Mexico’s
government and U.S. oil and gas companies seeking to cash in on a
policy made possible by the behind-the-scenes efforts of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s U.S. State Department.
State Department involvement was first revealed here on DeSmog,
pointing to emails obtained via Freedom of Information Act and cables
made available via Wikileaks.
The records also call into question the claim made by Mexico’s Energy
Secretary, Pedro Joaquín Coldwell, that the privatization policy was “100 percent made in Mexico.”
Coldwell said this in reaction to DeSmog’s investigation showing heavy
State Department involvement in ushering in the policy.
“It is absolutely false that Hillary Clinton or any other United
States government entity had anything to do with the Mexican energy
reform,” Coldwell stated.
If the U.S. government had nothing to with creating the policy
architecture to begin with, and its own records tell the opposite story,
then it sure is shocking how involved it is now in the attempt to
help U.S. companies build their profits from the new policy regime.
