wsj editorial: toppling iran's unsteady regime, page-2

Hi nobull. We continue to hope the regime changes. I would think Ross and Jordinson do too. The problem for them comes down to two questions:

1. When will it happen? It could be soon, it could be years. Bad totalitarian governments have a bad habit of staying on years beyond a sensible life - particularly in the mid east. We hoped they might be gone at least 2 years ago for all the same types of reason you cite now.

2. What will come next? There will be a vacuum of power of some sort. Will we see an Egypt style revolution in which the real power ie the military remains unchanged and thus possibly no effective change for us? If not the military will enough moderates and liberals be in power to allow a western company access to repatriate profits from what is now considered a national treasure? We have twice now been repudiated, the first time was in the early years with a different government from the Ahmadinejad rule. Who is to say we will get the Rafsanjani stle govt that allowed us to get the project to bankable stage?

For either or both question there is no clear answer on which to make management decisions about Mehdiabad beyond maintaining contact in Iran to keep our 'title' alive. There is certainly no current circumstance to justify avoiding dilution in Mehdiabad by not acting on other currently achievable interests. In fact it would most probably be illegal under Australian company law for UCL management to fail to maximise interests in current real prospects ie Sandpiper in favour of hope in a possibly never realisable stolen 'asset' in Iran.

I understand the struggle for you nobull with Mehdiabad being your sole reason for investing in this Aussie company. However the rational assessment surely must be that shareholders capital interests are better served by advancing and protecting Sandpiper and potentially increasing share there than doing otherwise to try and avoid giving part of Mehdiabad to MAK shareholders.

Besides that, the size of Mehdiabad means significant dilution for small UCL shareholders would happen anyway come financing and construction, if that ever comes. Every bit of Sandpiper gained now means more revenue to support UCLs share of Mehdiabad construction and thus less dilution at that stage.

MAK have had to face a similar management challenge and it lead to the attempt to take UCL over. Just like Mehdiabad, the Wonarah project is potentially a much more lucrative project than Sandpiper but is also stuck a bit in the never never and years, maybe as much as a decade, from practical realisation. Sandpiper is here and now and should be generating positive cash flow within a couple of years and then for decades to come. That is the essence of life itself for junior explorers like MAK and UCL. MAK clearly came to a sudden realisation after basically neglecting Sandpiper that it can secure their future and the more of it they can get the better. Obviously they failed but they are desperate not to lose to UCL in the reverse bid.