By JAMES GLANZ and RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
Published: July 3, 2008

Bush administration officials knew that a Texas oil company with close
ties to President Bush was planning to sign an oil deal with the
regional Kurdistan government that ran counter to American policy and
undercut Iraq's central government, a Congressional committee has
concluded.

The conclusions were based on e-mail messages and other documents that
the committee released Wednesday.

United States policy is to warn companies that they incur risks in
signing contracts until Iraq passes an oil law and to strengthen Iraq's
central government. The Kurdistan deal, by ceding responsibility for
writing contracts directly to a regional government, infuriated Iraqi
officials. But State Department officials did nothing to discourage the
deal and in some cases appeared to welcome it, the documents show.

The company, Hunt Oil of Dallas, signed the deal with Kurdistan's
semiautonomous government last September. Its chief executive, Ray L.
Hunt, a close political ally of President Bush, briefed an advisory
board to Mr. Bush on his contacts with Kurdish officials before the
deal was signed.

In an e-mail message released by the Congressional committee, a State
Department official in Washington, briefed by a colleague about the
impending deal with the Kurdistan Regional Government, wrote: "Many
thanks for the heads up; getting an American company to sign a deal
with the K.R.G. will make big news back here. Please keep us posted."

Source: http://tinyurl.com/4oy8p4