31.   Early this year, Chevron slashed investment plans at Tengiz, citing continuing difficulties getting the oil to market.

32.   It gets the oil under a special permit from the United Nations, bypassing the U.N. sanctions prohibiting Iraq from exporting oil.

33.   Kazakstan, which has been looking for ways to get its oil to international markets, signed an agreement Saturday to channel exports through Iran.

34.   Moreover, overland pipeline transit through Iran would get the oil to a part of the world where it can easily move east or west by sea.

35.   Russia would prefer to use the route because it is the most efficient way to get oil from the inland Caspian Sea to the Black Sea.

36.   To ease the energy crunch, Armenia has also announced plans to build an oil refinery and is negotiating to get oil from Russia.

37.   Getting oil from the ground -- frozen solid in the winter months -- remains extremely difficult in Kazakhstan, where reserves are estimated at three billion tonnes.

38.   As part of the deal, Pyongyang was to get free oil until its new reactors were on line and to benefit from improved relations with Washington.

39.   But investors invariably have one eye on political developments in the Caucasus, particularly given the concern over getting oil out of the turbulent region and onto world markets.

40.   Condensate can be purified to get oil.