Ramos-Horta on East Timor's Future, Woodside Dispute

Kurt Wulff (McDep Associates) submits: Contrarian Buy-recommended Woodside Petroleum Ltd (WOPEY.PK) aims to start up its Pluto liquefied natural gas (LNG) Train 1 in the first quarter of 2011, which will double LNG production.

With the world's attention locked on the World Cup in South Africa, it might be an odd time for East Timor to try to boost its international profile with a simple foot-race.But that's what President Jose Ramos-Horta is hoping to do with the Timor Marathon on June 20, billed as the climax of events to mark the fledgling nation's eighth anniversary of independence from Indonesia.Five hundred runners including 300 foreigners have already registered, but few will compete with more pride than national sports heroine Aguida Amaral.

An East Timor court is to deliver its verdict on Wednesday against 28 people including an Australian citizen charged over the attempted assassination of the president and prime minister in 2008.Prosecutors have called for sentences of up to 20 years in jail against the defendants over the February 11 attack by rebels in the tiny former Indonesian territory.Gunmen shot at President Jose Ramos-Horta outside his Dili home, leaving him critically wounded, and also fired on the car of Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao, who escaped unhurt.

Woodside Petroleum Ltd., Australia’s second-biggest oil producer, said it’s in talks with companies for a potential partnership to enter Canada’s natural gas industry to tap rising Asian demand. “It’s natural in an area that has the sort of hydrocarbon resource that Canada does that Woodside is in there talking to people,” Chief Executive Officer Peter Coleman said Thursday in an interview in Sydney, declining to name any companies.