Report 65 — Mark Reading
Three days have been allocated to the testimony of Mark Reading, head of security at Talisman, between 1999-2013, and later hired as a consultant for Lundin Oil. Reading was part of a team hired by Lundin at the commencement of the investigation into the company, tasked with mapping out witnesses.
Testimony of Mark Reading
The presence of media journalists on Tuesday morning outside of Courtroom 34 came as no surprise after seeing Reading’s name on the court docket. He was called as a witness by both the prosecution and by Ian Lundin’s defense team because of his involvement in the matter both before and during the investigation.
Martina Winslow opened the examination in chief by asking him to describe his background and how he came to work at Talisman, the Canadian oil company operating in Blocks 1, 2 and 4. Reading gave only curt responses, giving the impression that he was there to answer the question in as little detail as possible. Reading served in the British military from 1975-1999 when he left service and started working for Talisman. He stayed with Talisman until 2013 and worked as a consultant for Lundin Oil during 2014-2019.
1999-2013 at Talisman
Reading was head of security for Talisman staff in Sudan. He reported directly to the country manager, Raul Kapling. The base was in Khartoum but he advised that he frequently visited the operational blocks. The rotations were 70 days on and 20 days off, with approximately 25-50% of those 70 days being spent in the field. Reading briefly described that one always needed a desert pass to move around in the field and a chaperone, especially at the start. Their movements were controlled by the Sudanese National Security. Over time, the amount of surveillance or control by the government decreased because they established trust between them. Winslow asked about his colleagues. Reading said most of his colleagues were GNPOC, representatives at the Khartoum office, the country manager, and finance, community and security staff.
Reading gave a brief description of the security situation upon his arrival. “The security situation was clear.” The first crisis occurred within the first month of his arrival: then-president Omar Al-Bashir had arrested his second in command and the company went into lockdown as a result of the instability. There was also an ongoing civil war in the south. Reading said that he knew little about the Khartoum Peace Agreement at the time of his arrival. The CEO of Talisman had come to Khartoum to speak with Riek Machar about the KPA and about the potential for the situation to deteriorate, to which Machar responded by providing assurances to the company that the situation would remain stable. However, Machar defected from the government soon after and joined the SPLA. “It was clear then that the KPA was over.” What he now knew about the KPA, he did not know at the time he said. The KPA held the factions together, which was positive from a security perspective. Reading told the court that the area of operation was dominated by SPLA-allied militias, mainly consisting of people of the Nuer tribe. The security situation worsened when the KPA fell apart. “In 2000, it was noted that there was an uptick in security events in the areas of operation. This was proof of the KPA falling apart.” The SPLA and its leader, John Garang, were a threat to the oil operations.
Winslow queried the security measures in place while Reading was there, asking if he collaborated with GNPOC on security. “I wouldn’t use collaboration as a term,” he said curtly, his feelings about the situation clear to the court. He described a poor relationship between the two. “There was no trust. Some were fanatical. At that time, they thought we were American spies or other conspiracies making them paranoid.” GNPOC security was part of the National Security operations and were responsible for providing chaperones for field work.
In Khartoum, movement was not restricted, but strict control was applied in the field. One needed to fly in on a GNPOC plane, obtain a desert pass which only the regime could sign off on, and a chaperone. The strict surveillance indicated a strong lack of trust. This lack of trust extended to security reporting as well. Reading told the court that they did not obtain much security information from them and if they did, it could not be trusted. “They had international investors and wanted us to think everything was okay, so they would not tell us what was happening.” Although the situation improved incrementally over time, it was a slow and long process. Reading was kicked out of Sudan twice within the first 18 months. He described it as a cultural thing: your relationship improved if you went through setbacks together. Asked to elaborate, Reading explained that two Canadian pilots knocked on his door ten days after his arrival, asking if they should make the flight to Haiti. They were worried because they could see fighting outside the city. Reading went to the roof and saw shooting, RPGs, and explosions moving towards Khartoum and he told them to stand by until he could find out what was happening. He was called in by Mohammad Maktar, who introduced himself as “the most important man in Khartoum who knows everything about security.” Moktar smashed his hand on the table and asked why he had stopped the flights, and that there had been no shootings or explosions. He then deported Reading.
Security reports were initially thin on subject matter and facts but gradually became better as their knowledge and networks expanded. They received information from GNPOC, NGOs, and other companies, like Lundin, Reading said. When Winslow asked if GNPOC read his reports, Reading laughed, asking if she was joking. Judge Zander, seemingly displeased with his response, told him this was no laughing matter. “Of course not, because there was no trust.” The reports he wrote were for the company only. “The military did not help me or Talisman; they organized security on behalf of the government to protect their assets. In this situation, that was the oil operation.” Reading could not provide any information about the relationship between GNPOC and the Sudanese government. He said that Blocks 1,2 and 4 were largely under the control of the Sudanese government.
The questions then focused on Block 5A and their security provider, Petroleum Security (Petsec). Reading knew that they provided security in Block 5A but nothing more as they were not active in Talisman’s blocks. Through Rapport, he got to know Lundin Oil’s security consultants, such as Dick Diery, Richard Ramsey, Ian Hood and John Gleneday. He said he would see them in the field and in Rubkhona, and that they would have coffee together in Khartoum sometimes. They also communicated via email, but the frequency would depend on the security situation. Reading said he went to their camp 4-5 times a year, otherwise communication would largely be via email and messages.
Talisman was subject to an investigation by the Canadian government with the possibility of sanctions being levelled against them. Reading told the court that he found the criticism unfair.
Block 5A was not under the control of the government; rather, with the fragmentation of the KPA, Reading said there were militias allied with the government and SPLA in the block, making it a dangerous area. “For the rebels it was just areas.” The warlords, which was how Reading referred to the militia commanders, would change allegiances which in turn would create displacements and affect the security situation for civilians and the companies. This was what the situation looked like in Block 5A. The information he received from Lundin Oil was “the best information we had access to.” They worked within the same parameters, he said, working with Petroleum Security like he worked with GNPOC. Reading said that PetSec was similar to GNPOC and that Talisman and Lundin were “in the same boat” with regards to security ‘collaboration’ and that the two were “cut from the same cloth.” He said he was sure they had had conversations about it at the time but that he could not remember their impression or opinion. He did not know whether Lundin staff faced the same reprisals as he did.
The deterioration of the security situation was gradual from 2000 throughout 2002. He thought the timeline could have been similar that in to Block 5A but could not say for sure. When asked what the SPLA thought of the oil operations in and around the area, Reading stated that he could not know what the SPLA thought. They had a role in the conflict, but he could only speculate as to the motives behind their attacks. “An analysis would suggest that the rebels were opposed to the government and that they wanted the oil operations to stop.” He continued by saying that if you had resources, you had an advantage and that they might have tried to re-balance the scale. When asked about the militias, he again prefaced his answer by emphasizing that it was an opinion. He said the tribes supported the warlords, and some factions joined with others to create bigger militias. The factions then fell out and changed allegiances. “Quite often you would not know about the movements of these defects until after the fact.”
After lunch, prosecutor Winslow resumed the examination in chief with a focus on the delayed construction of the all-weather road from Rubkhona to Thar Jath. Reading told the court that he likely had conversations about that with staff from Lundin. He was careful not to blame it solely on the security situation. “The security situation played a part, but it could have been other things, contracts etc.” Winslow produced a report from February 1-8, 2000 regarding the road construction, reading from it that a “large number of troops” would be sent to “secure the construction of the road.” Reading could not confirm his sources, saying it was the first time he had seen the report in 25 years and that there would have been a variety of sources, such as the UN, embassies, field intelligence from contractors, and NGOs. In response to why troops were required, Reading said that it made sense logistically. He explained that dry season was fighting season, and the rainy season made it difficult to move around. This could have affected the logistics of operations.
Winslow displayed a report from 16 February 2000 discussing the bombing of the Thar Jath rig site and asked him about his knowledge of the security situation and whether he discussed such incidents with the Lundin Oil security staff. Reading responded that the operation and security tempo was “dynamic and increasing” and that they “spoke to each other all the time anyway.” He said he mostly spoke to the Khartoum office representatives rather than people in the field. Another report from 1 March 2000, also displayed on the courtroom’s four screens, summarized an attack by Peter Gadet’s forces in relation to Lundin’s road construction. Winslow asked Reading for a comment. He was short in saying it was all in the report: the silence after that short answer indicated he had no intention of giving more context. Further questions from the prosecutor uncovered that the attack by Gadet’s forces against Talisman’s camp in Heglig in August 2000 was the most serious incident during Reading’s time, but the security situation around this time was worsening for everyone.
On 5-8 May 2001, Reading travelled with a group of EU ambassadors along the all-weather road six months post construction, with Lundin Oil hosting a three-day barbeque. Reading told the court he could not remember the helicopter ride, saying that it may have been mentioned in previous reports, but he did remember the barbeque. The roads were controversial, he said. They were built for the oil operation, only for the purposes of self-interest. However, he said the construction of roads increased the opportunities for the civilian population to move around, for trade and access to medical care. He told the court that the budget for community projects were initially 5000 US dollars, but that the amount had increased significantly to 7 million USD by the time he left. He said a hospital was built in Heglig for 2 million USD.
Winslow then tried to gain some clarity around a ‘corridor’ mentioned in one of the security reports. It proposed a 20-kilometer-wide corridor around the all-weather road. Reading could not answer what the purpose of the so-called corridor was, nor what it would look like. There was in fact some confusion as to which road was mentioned in the report. Winslow asked if the report referred to the all-weather road, but Reading was not sure if it referred to that road or the old Chevron road.
The Harker report was published in January 2000, and Reading authored a report based on the former one in June of the same year in which he described Antonov airplanes as frequent visitors in Heglig and speculated that bombings may become more frequent in October and November. The bombings from Antonov airplanes were described as not precise, resulting in accidents occurring. The incident at the Thar Jath rig site in October 1999 was such an incident. Reading explained that he was not in Sudan at the time of this report and that he was referring to events in May of that year and was speculating as to what might happen later in the year. It was during his first trip to Heglig that he found out that every airstrip was government-owned. The information about the planes and airstrip mentioned in the report came from employees in the area. They had been very concerned about the bomber planes and ammunition they had seen. Reading explained that this was a concern because their presence made the location a “legitimate war target and then the company will become involved in the civil war.” Reading raised this issue with the company, and he said they took the concerns seriously. It was after this campaign that the Harker report was published. After reading sections from his own report, Reading told the court he was embarrassed. “It’s very raw and honest and has far-reaching conclusions. How could I know this and how did I conclude that?” He said he would have written it differently today.
When asked about his opinion on the Sudanese government’s use of bombs, Reading responded that “the government is the government, and they did not care.” He called the conflict an ongoing “low-tech bush war in Africa without media attention,” saying that the Islamic government was an outcast from the international arena.
Karolina Wieslander took the lead on the examination in chief in the afternoon. She began the examination with questions regarding the Heglig incident on 5 August 2001. Reading told the court that Peter Gadet was behind the attack and that he had contacted GNPOC immediately. The security out in the field increased as a result and GNPOC increased physical security in and around the area, creating a defensive parameter of 7 km around Heglig. He did not remember what if any effect this had on security. Ken Barker, the country manager for Lundin Oil, wrote a report on the incident and the aftermath dated 12 August 2001. The report mentioned displacement and cleansing going on and the effects after the attacks on Talisman. Reading explained that the government moved special forces into the area and conducted a follow-up operation to find the rebels. He had since met and spoken to Gadet about the planning and execution of the attack. He said he did not recognize the language used in Harker’s report, nor did he share the same view on the aftermath. The focus was on crisis management within the company. The employees were shaken. A hotline to executives of the company was set up in an attempt to find out the next steps and Reading was given 30 days to conduct a security assessment, which would determine what Talisman would do next.
The security situation in 2001 was at its worst, closely followed by 2000. Reading could not say if Block 5A followed the same pattern. Reading said that from what he observed, GNPOC was reactive: they did not have a strategy as far as he could tell. He emphasized that he had very little trust in them. His guess as to their strategy was that they liked to move in garrisons – the reason being that they feared the SPLA who were more effective on the battlefield. The government had access to air attacks, however, which tipped the scales in their favor. When asked to elucidate on his distrust for GNPOC and the Sudanese military, he said it was the “lack of trust for outsiders” and that there was nothing more to add. The prosecution’s questions then focused on the increased instability in Block 5A as a result of the military moving in. Reading said there would have been an increase in clashes between rebels and military. He said that he had no power despite being head of security, and that all power was with GNPOC. To operate successfully in Sudan, he suggested, one should rely on community development instead of power or force.
The prosecution stated that the rebels continued to make a concentrated effort to stop oil production south of Bentiu and asked whether he recalled there being an increased threat to oil production. Reading could not recall any specific memories but mentioned that a peace initiative came in 2002. He could not say if the situation improved for Lundin Oil during the same period.
The security situation for Talisman was the best in 2002. On the second day of the prosecution’s examination, Reading once again responded to their questions with brief and curt answers. Reading told the court that splits and defections within the different militias impacted the security situation. His focus was on Blocks 1,2 and 4, but such events would have an impact anywhere. There was an incident in August 2000, when a militia split resulted in fighting south of Bentiu. He said sixty refugees arrived in Bentiu to flee the conflict. He could not specify which militia split but said that this was common during 2000-2002. A report from 31 December 2001 discussed the effects on various areas after the militia split. Reading said that the splits would likely affect Block 5A more as that area was not under government control. The prosecution asked Reading to comment on further reports on the security situation, but he said that everything he knew was included in the reports or that he could not remember where he received information or the context surrounding the information. Reading was then asked if he discussed the worsening humanitarian situation in Block 5A with Lundin Oil staff. He said that they looked at causation when they authored reports. He said that the militias, defections from one side to another, and the fighting were the cause of the situation. Reading said they would do their best to help the people in their blocks by providing tents and food. “The main root cause was the civil war, as we see today, the second root cause was the militias.”
The prosecution then asked Reading about his trip to Leer in May 2001, which at that time was under the control of SSIM, with attachments to the regime. He said that the militias lived amongst the civilians and lived off of them. They had roadblocks and taxes, and there would be cattle raids and widespread disputes in which the warring parties used firearms. A further report from February 2002 described fighting south of Rubkhona and Bentiu, that government forces had increased, and that they were determined to “stabilize Block 5A.” Reading told the court that it was a deteriorating situation and that the block was closed for operation for periods of time. The oil company staff were not present. In response to a question regarding fighting south of Block 4, Reading told the court that civil war “ebbs and flows.” Nihaldiu was located south of the river and was not under government control, but he could not say which militia controlled it nor why the government wanted to take the area.
The questions then moved back to Gadet, and actions taken by the government against him and SPLA. Gadet was a militia commander who was supported by SPLA, he said, and he was an enemy to the military. None of these warlords were “good guys.” Gadet fought on both sides of the war and defected many times. At the time of the attack against Heglig, he was allied with the SPLA. Reading could not pinpoint where he was at other times. He told the court that any commander was a threat the whole time. The militias would be sponsored by the government or the rebels, but even the sponsors would not trust them because they could defect at any time. This was evidenced by the fact that the militias would be supplied “thinly” with resources. Gadet had a reputation as the most effective and deadly commander. Even though the government fought him, they tried to entice him to come back. Reading described it as, “It’s the culture there.” The prosecutor requested permission to ask questions about Reading’s police interview in September 2016, where he stated that the government maintained a defensive posture to secure the oil for the first two years. At the end of 2001 and start of 2002, they decided to do something about Gadet.
The weekly security update dated 2 December 2001 was displayed on the screens and discussed how the road extension west from Thar Jath to Nihaldiu would be contentious because the area was under Gadet’s control. The report asserted that the road would be beneficial to security when completed but that there “will likely be plenty of incidents” getting to that point. Reading maintained his opinion of roads being beneficial for the civilians and necessary for the oil operations; however, he said, they were contentious because the military or the militias could take control of them. Reading took his point further by telling the court that the military could travel anywhere if they wanted to; the roads would just make it easier. When asked whether Gadet would have been opposed to the road construction, Reading said he might have been because it would have been within his area of control. In a weekly report authored by Reading, dated 5 March 2002, the court was shown a discussion of measures to be taken against Gadet who was in Nihaldiu at this time and that pressure would mount on Lundin Oil to finance a road to Nihaldiu, as requested by the government. This road was brought up in various documents, for example in a report by Ken Barker, but Reading was unable to give more details on the road or the request itself, stating that he did not participate in operational meetings. When asked about the reliability and sources of information in these reports, he said he never received much information from GNPOC and the information he did receive he would have to consider why they wanted him to know that. He described it as a “cat and mouse game.”
The following security reports mainly focused on Gadet and further road construction. However, the court did not receive any clarity as to the sources Reading relied upon for his reports. Maintaining a curt approach to the prosecution’s questions, Reading seemed to become more and more agitated as he told prosecution that he was just “repeating earlier answers.” The prosecution continued, asking Reading why the government would want to extend road construction further to Leer considering the bush areas were controlled by the rebels. Reading told the court that the weakness of the ongoing war was that neither side could hold their ground for long. They would “take one area and then pull back, only for the other side to do the same.” This was because neither side had the numbers, nor the necessary equipment. He again emphasized the size of the areas they were fighting over. They were immense, and it was not uncommon for the government to control a particular area while the rebels controlled the bush around it. The overall instability of the civil war was often discussed. “We tried to get a broad perspective,” Reading said, but he could pinpoint specific discussions or with whom they were had. Instability was constant until he left. Reports from October 2002 noted a heavy bombing campaign.
Reading remembered that Muhammad Moktar commenced work as head of security for Lundin Oil but said he was not sure how that came about. Moktar had a reputation for being difficult to deal with, and Reading speculated that the staff would not have been happy about his appointment. He said that Ken Barker had a negative reaction to this but could not add more information referring to the report, saying only “it’s all there.”
2014-2019 at Lundin Oil
Reading left Lundin Oil in 2019, at which point he had been working for the company as a consultant since 2014. When asked if he had had any contact with the company’s lawyers, he told the court that yes, he had participated in the separate investigation conducted by Hogan Lovells. Ewa Korpi took over the examination in chief and focused her questions on Reading’s role for the company between 2014-2019. Reading described his consultant role as encompassing various tasks, explaining the legal process from his own experiences with the Talisman case, and traveling to Sudan for the purposes of identifying potential witnesses and weaknesses in the case. Two lawyers from Lundin provided him with instructions, he said, and he reported directly to them. It was not until 2015 that he conducted these field trips, primarily to Juba and Khartoum, but he also went to Heglig and the border area between Sudan and South Sudan. They employed locals in the field to help them locate witnesses, and they would be instructed by himself and Margarite Damile, who accompanied him on the field trips. He called it a “very corporate process.” Reading told the court that the focus of the field trip was to create a list of people of interest and with experience and knowledge within different areas like security, seismic, etc. It was called the 800 list because of how long it was.
In Khartoum, the core group was Matt Moudera and Simon Joseph. Jacob Hattem was present at some point; he had previously been employed as head of security in one of the state’s companies. Mohammad Dali was present as well; he had previously worked in Block 5A and joined Petronas Security afterwards. Ewa Korpi asked Reading if he remembered the names of people on this list, but he said he could not. Korpi displayed a report of a threatening call made to one of the witnesses, Josef Marial, and his family, by Andrew Jagei. Reading described him as a “very threatening character” and very difficult to work with, though Reading himself never met him. He said that Jagei had been the leader of the radio operators, and he had threatened Margarite and attempted to extort the company as well. This call was taped, he said, and they had sent the tapes to the company, but the company did not want to “get into a tit for tat” so the matter was never followed up on. When asked if anyone in his team had contacted witnesses when they were not supposed to, Reading told the court that they “ran a tight ship with strict discipline” and that no one should have been contacted in a threatening manner and without him or Margarite knowing. The people on the 800-list were called in for interviews, but only people with useful information and ones that had not been contacted by prosecution.
Percy Bratt, one of the plaintiff’s attorneys, questioned Reading about the alleged threats made against plaintiffs by Reading’s team, saying that he had testimonies disproving Reading’s denial. Reading maintained that he knew of threats made by Jagei in 2015 and that he was shocked to hear about it, but that he was unaware of any other incidents. Anders Sjögren, the other plaintiffs’ attorney, asked Reading about the displacement of civilians and “area clearance.” Reading told the court that displacement was a common theme throughout the conflict and that it was a result of fighting between militias and government as well as between different militias and factions. He told the court that looking at his reports now, there were many things he would do differently.
On the final day of his testimony, it was time for Lundin’s defense team to cross-examine Reading. The cross was led by Torgny Wetterberg. He sought to clarify Reading’s movements throughout the years and the stages of Talisman’s operation in the blocks. Reading did not know of any military offensive in Block 5A as that block was not his focus. He noted that there was mainly militia activity in the area. Peter Gadet controlled Nihaldiu, which was a small percentage of Block 4 not under government control. The attacks on Nhaldiu in 2002 were the government attacking Gadet as he posed a significant threat to areas with oil operations, as evidenced by the Heglig attack. It was suggested that one reason was to improve GNPOC’s situation, referring to Reading’s statements in his police interview, and he agreed. Reading told the court that he never witnessed any bombings himself but said it was not his impression that they were used against civilians. He further stated that there was no need for GNPOC to displace civilians in order to operate and maintained that the militias and Gadet were the main threat.
Johan Rainer conducted the cross-examination for Schneiter’s defense team. He commenced with asking Reading about the threats against plaintiffs in 2014-2015, which Reading maintained he had only heard of Andrew Jagei and that the other allegations were “nonsense.” He said Simon Joseph would see Jagei socially and that during one of these meetings Jagei requested that Joseph go back to “the white people” to ask for money in return for him leaving the matter alone. The request was recorded and forwarded to the Lundin lawyers.
