Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says he won't respect a decision by the World Bank's arbitration body regarding a dispute with ExxonMobil.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says he won't respect a decision by the World Bank's arbitration body regarding a dispute with ExxonMobil.
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Story highlights

Venezuela and ExxonMobil are feuding over the 2007 nationalization of a project

A case is pending before a World Bank dispute arbitration body

President Hugo Chavez Venezuela "will not recognize any decisions" of the panel

This month a Paris-based body said Venezuela owes Exxon $907 million

Caracas, Venezuela CNN  — 

When the World Bank’s arbitration body weighs in on a dispute between Venezuela and ExxonMobil, President Hugo Chavez says he won’t respect the decision.

The oil giant and officials from the South American nation have been feuding since 2007, when Chavez’s government nationalized a joint project in the country’s crude-rich Orinoco belt.

A case before the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) is pending.

“I will say it once. We will not recognize any decisions of the ICSID. We will not recognize them,” Chavez said on state television Sunday.

A hearing in the ICSID case is scheduled for the first quarter of 2012, according to a summary of the dispute pub