Here’s an interesting comment from a Reuters article on resource nationalism:
With supplies tightening, experts said, competition among consumers to lock up future crude is rising, with top consumer the United States facing tough challenges from emerging economies, such as China. “Chinese companies are in a much better position to deal with energy producers and to sign deals with them,” said Anne Korin, co-director of the Institute for the Analysis and Global Security, a nonprofit energy think tank. “If Saudi Arabia, or any country, does a deal with an American company, it is pestered about the fact that women have no rights and there is no religions freedom. With the Chinese, they give you money, you give them oil, end of story.”