First of all Andrew I'm not denigrating UCL or its holders.Its...

First of all Andrew I'm not denigrating UCL or its holders.Its obviously a great resource and may well in time overcome the problems of the current politically instability.

As much as the locals want it to happen it will be the head honcho's within the Iranian political establishment that have the ultimate say in whether such a western invested driven project will get off the ground.

Buffets comments I believe are aimed at companies that have the potential to be reworked in some kind of way.Thats what he specialises in.He buys undervalued poorly run operations that can be turned around.Here we are talking about a greenfields project that has some fairly large obstacles to overcome.As mentioned basics such as a bfs,political support for the project,etc,etc.

I have given my reasons as to why I think Perkoa will succeed but until the market,which is of totally western perception,see's the Iranian political situation on the improve,UCL will struggle.Burkina Faso is a fairly riskless country.However that may change if any locals see Perkoa as not benefiting the locals enough as AVM is finding out atm in the Congo.

Like I say I could be wrong and the resource may just be a strong enough carrot for all to want it to go ahead.

One of the other probs it has is that it would be a big operation that would take considerable investment.Perhaps this is where these countries,Saudi's,Iran,Iraq should be putting all their oil dollars rather than building monuement skyscraypers to themselves.

I believe the only solution to these countries problems is to do what the Europeans have done and create a regional economy that will give them some economic pulling power and stability.Until they learn to live together and tolerate each others various cultural beliefs and compromise where needed without blowing each other to Allah not many of these projects will get off the ground.


d.