Asia Times | Mysterious oil company a key player in Idlib | Article
▻https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/06/opinion/mysterious-oil-company-a-key-player-in-idlib
Watad, la très étrange société pétrolière active sur le marché d’Idlib, avec inévitablement la bénédiction de Daech et des Turcs...
Fuel and cooking gas are in very short supply in the parts of Syria controlled by the Assad regime. Yet in Idlib, the last rebel-held pocket of the country and currently the target of an intense military offensive, these and other essentials are not only available, but affordable. This is thanks to a company named Watad Petroleum.
But who or what is Watad? If suspicions are true, Watad – about which little is known – represents yet another way in which Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an organization labeled a terrorist group by much of the world, is strengthening its grip on Idlib.
Life in this province of northwestern Syria has, without a doubt, been made easier by Watad’s presence. But with no information available publicly about who owns or runs it, there is a persistent suspicion about it.
The first that anyone had heard of Watad was in January last year, when it was granted a monopoly over the fuel market in greater Idlib, with exclusive rights to import oil and gas from Turkey and to regulate their sale, price and distribution. Ostensibly, the deal, which also eliminated any domestic competition, was struck with Idlib’s Salvation Government, but in reality it was with HTS, the de facto power in that area.
Before then, people in Idlib were reliant on motor fuel and gas transported from government-controlled areas and on crude oil brought in from northeastern Syria, which is now controlled by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces. But economic sanctions and the Turkish-led offensive to capture the predominantly Kurdish region of Afrin led to those supply lines being severed. Enter Watad Petroleum.
Some reports say the company was founded in Idlib in 2017, while others maintain it was established in early 2018 by a group of Syrian businessmen living in Turkey. What is certain is that the mysterious Watad Petroleum has become a key player in Greater Idlib.