Draft cover for “The Oil Road” arrives in office – what do you think?

The draft cover has arrived for Platform’s new book “The Oil Road”, due out with Verso in September. We’re gathering input from our circles and supporters. Would you pick this up in a shop? What are the three first words that come to mind when you see this cover? Please tweet us @platformlondon or email...

Exploring The Oil Road – Two Platform events in Bristol and London

There are two Platform events coming up which explore themes in our forthcoming book The Oil Road by Mika Minio and James Marriott, due out in September. The first event is a talk in the Bristol Festival of Ideas – What if we left the oil in the ground? Taking place at Arnolfini on Sunday 20th...
"The Oil Road" - in search of a subtitle

“The Oil Road” – in search of a subtitle

Platform has submitted a complete manuscript of “The Oil Road” to Verso; it’s gone to the copy-editors now and will be published in May (with a different cover!). But we’re still trying to pick a sub-title – do you have any suggestions? Here’s a blurb about the book, and we’ve copied some possible subtitles below....

BP violated human rights rules, says UK government

Company failed to respond to alleged intimidation by Turkish security forces along its UK-backed Caspian oil pipeline Ruling places BP in breach of loan agreements, say campaigners A BP-led consortium is breaking international rules governing the human rights responsibilities of multinational companies in its operations on the controversial Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, the UK Government ruled...

BP keeps digging deeper under Caspian

The main workhorse of Azeri oil production – the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field – will peak in 2010, due to BP and consortium members driving an aggressively fast extraction programme. As the revenues poured in over the last eight years, the state budget soared, covering military expansion, President Aliev’s opulent lifestyle and doubtful infrastructure projects including a...

Industrialising the Cukurova

After a cushy night on the Ankara – Adana Mavi Cukurova night train, we jumped straight into a coach headed east to Antakya. Once the grand city of Antioch benefiting from trade routes running between Europe & South Asia, medium-sized Antakya is the last Turkish town before Syria, and the source of an ongoing border dispute...