The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Oil of Iraq, Hussain Al Shahristani, will deliver the next IISS Oberoi Lecture on August 14 at 6 pm at The Trident in Nariman Point, Mumbai.
Al-Shahristani will speak on “Recent Trends in the Global Energy Economy”and Iraq’s readiness to sell more oil to India. External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid called on Al-Shahristani in Baghdad last month to explore this possibility.
Al-Shahristani, who has been a Deputy Chairman of the Iraqi National Assembly and Head of the Iraqi National Academy of Sciences, spent more than a decade (1979-1991) as a political prisoner in the infamous Abu Ghraib prison under the regime of Saddam Hussein for his refusal to help the regime build an atomic weapon.
He escaped during a bombing raid on Baghdad during the First Gulf War and fled to Iran where he served as head of the Gulf War Victims Organization from 1991-1995. He later continued his support for the victims of Saddam Hussein’s regime as head of the Iraqi Political Prisoners Union (2003) and as Head of the Iraqi Refugees Aid Council (1998-2003).
Before his arrest and imprisonment, Al-Shahristani served as Chief Scientific Advisor to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission.
He will be in Mumbai as a guest of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). The lecture is open to public.
