Venezuelan Government to Recognize ICC Determination in Exxon Mobil Case http://venezuela-us.org/2012/01/09/venezuelan-government-to-recognize-icc-determination-in-exxon-mobil-case/ During his weekly show Alo, Presidente, President Hugo Chávez reiterated that the Venezuelan government will only recognize the lawsuit by the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), which ruled that the state-owned company PDVSA shall pay $908 million to Exxon Mobil, an amount that was reduced to $225 after a series of deductions.On Sunday, speaking from the Orinoco Oil Belt, the president said Venezuela will not recognize any decision by the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in the lawsuit brought by the U.S. oil company Exxon Mobil against PDVSA for the nationalization of its assets in 2007.“Exxon Mobil was expecting to charge PDVSA $12 billion, and in the end we’re going to pay $200 million. They are immoral. Despite the decision in Paris, now they threaten us with the ICSID, an organization from which we have to withdraw. We will not recognize any decision by the ICSID. They expect the impossible,” Chávez said.The Venezuelan president said that the $12 billion requested by Exxon Mobil in compensation for the nationalization of the Cerro Negro project located in the Orinoco Oil Belt shows the agenda of the company, which he said has stolen from Venezuela during 50 years of oil exploitation.“They expected to steal from us again. What moral parameters does that company have? That’s the sort of people that owned all this [Orinoco Oil Belt], it’s the empire and its tentacles. They would pay whatever they wanted in taxes,” Chávez added.The president said the oil firm also threatened to seize PDVSA’s subsidiary in the U.S., CITGO Petroleum Corporation, which “must be worth about $20 billion.”

“They will see, we won’t give in to imperialism,” highlighted the Venezuelan president.

President Chávez also commented on the importance of creating an organization within UNASUR (the Union of South American Nations) for settling differences among companies in the region so that Latin American countries don’t have to appeal to organizations based in the U.S. and Europe.