Directors and Management

David Donnelly was CEO of the Private Equity business of Fleming Family and Partners until March 2008. He also sits on the board of two quoted Electra Kingsway Venture Capital Trusts. Previously, David was Chairman and Chief Executive of Highland Participants plc, which was one of the fastest growing and most successful UK independent oil companies in the 1980's. Highland developed partnerships with 23 companies, including Kerr-McGee in the North Sea. It operated in the US, in Texas and Oklahoma, as well as both onshore and offshore the UK. David graduated from Trinity College, Dublin with an honours degree in Mechanical Engineering and a Masters in Economics.

Yves Merer is a French national with a wealth of international oil and gas experience, acquired over a 30-year career with Shell. A graduate of the prestigious School of Geology in Nancy, France, Yves holds a Masters in Petroleum Economics from the French Institute of Petroleum and began his career in the mining sector before joining Shell in 1979. After twelve years in operations and production roles in the North Sea and Brunei, Yves moved to London in 1992 and spent four years in a regional business governance role, managing Shell’s interests in French-speaking West Africa. Recognised for his diplomatic and relationship-building skills, in 1996 he was appointed General Manager of Salym Petroleum Development in Siberia. This was Shell’s first successful Russian joint venture business. Yves then served as Chairman of Shell Syria, based in Damascus, before moving to Beijing for three years as President of Shell China Exploration and Production, in charge of a large portfolio of exploration, development and production assets, both onshore and offshore. In 2006, he moved to Tehran to take on his final role with Shell. As Iran Country Chairman, he was responsible for several joint ventures, large oil and gas projects and a number of important contracts. In 2010, when the tightening of sanctions brought activity to a halt, Yves decided to leave Shell and, prior to joining Caithness, worked for a year as a strategic advisor to a large privately owned Saudi conglomerate.

Robert Kennedy has over 30 years' experience in the international oil and gas industry. He is a founder and major shareholder of Caithness Petroleum and served as CEO from the time of the Company's formation until August 2011. Mr Kennedy was CEO of Anglo Siberian Oil Company plc from 1992 until 2003, when it was acquired by Rosneft. Prior to this he was Director of International Negotiations with Kerr-McGee from 1976 to 1992. While at Kerr-McGee he was involved with the discovery and development of the Brae, Beatrice, Scott and Gryphon fields in the North Sea. Previously he was with Sunningdale Oils Limited, a successful Canadian independent which made major oil discoveries and was purchased by Kerr-McGee in 1976. Robert read law at Clare College Cambridge and was awarded a BA degree, then attended Harvard Business School as a Harkness fellow and was awarded an MBA.

From 1992 to 2003 Paul Clarke-Walker was director of the operating subsidiaries of Anglo Siberian Oil Company plc. Since 1986 he has held appointments as Director of a number of major companies or their subsidiaries including Canadian Occidental. Paul previously worked in public accountancy practice in the UK for 22 years. He is a Fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants.

Ian Strachan is currently an independent director of several listed companies in both the UK and the US: Transocean Inc, Xstrata plc, Rolls Royce plc and Johnson Matthey plc. He was also non-executive Chairman of Instinet Inc and a director of Reuters plc.

Ian was previously Chief Executive at BTR plc and Deputy Chief Executive and CFO at Rio Tinto plc (formerly RTZ plc). Prior to that he spent 16 years at Exxon most of which was as a senior executive in the Far East and South East Asia and in New York where he was head of Corporate Strategy.

Ian was educated at Christ's College, Cambridge where he took a double first in History, Princeton University (Master in Public Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School) and Harvard University where he was a Teaching Fellow.

Peter de Wit is a Dutch national who spent most of his 40-year career with Shell in the downstream oil marketing and natural gas sectors, based at various times in the UK, the USA, the Netherlands and a number of locations in the Far East. A graduate in economics and political science from Trinity College, Dublin, Peter held management roles in Shell’s Australian and Dutch retail oil marketing and global gas marketing business in the UK and USA, before moving to London in the mid-1990s as Vice President Aviation and Marine Products and Vice President-Commercial of Shell Coal. In 1998, Peter was appointed Strategy Director for Shell’s Gas and Power division and in 1999 joined this division’s Executive Committee, as Executive Vice President responsible for the Middle East Region.

In 2002, he relocated to Singapore to serve as Executive Vice President for the critical Asia Pacific Region, overseeing Shell’s high profile Asian gas business and a number of new LNG and coal gasification projects including in the Russian Far East, Australia and China. At that time he also served as non-executive Board member of Woodside Petroleum. In 2005, he returned to The Hague as Executive Vice President responsible for Shell’s Global LNG business and, from late 2007 until his retirement in May 2011, served as President and Country Chairman, Shell Netherlands. In addition to his business accountabilities, while based in The Hague, Peter was also responsible for Government relations and represented Shell on numerous boards, industry and government-sponsored bodies.

John Roper was appointed a Director of Caithness Petroleum Limited in June 2008.

John has been based in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates since 1991 and is currently Vice President LNG and Upstream of E.ON Ruhrgas and is also Chairman of the Dubai Petroleum Club.

John has worked in the oil and gas industry for over 25 years. John spent the early part of his career working in the UK North Sea, and has since gained extensive international experience in regional company management and oil and gas operations in the Middle East, North Africa and the Caspian regions. He has worked for companies including Petro-Canada, EnCana, Cairn Energy and Neste Oy. John has a successful record of finding, negotiating and concluding sound commercial contracts with host governments and international companies. He has served as a member of the Board of Directors of offshore companies.

John has a BSc degree in Geology from Kings College, London and an MSc degree in Marine Geology and Geophysics from University College, London

Peter O'Sullivan joined Caithness Petroleum from Booz Allen Hamilton, a leading global strategy consulting firm, where he was a Senior Associate. While at Booz Allen, Mr O'Sullivan focused on strategic issues relating to business growth and cost reduction for Upstream Oil & Gas and Telecoms clients. Prior to this he worked for Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) from 1995 to 1999, where he designed and delivered on business process outsourcing services for the energy industry. He began his career as an oil and gas field engineer for Caterpillar. Mr O'Sullivan has an first class honours degree in Mechanical Engineering from University College Dublin, an MSc in Cognitive Science with distinction from the University of Edinburgh, and an MBA from INSEAD.

Jesse Meidl is a Canadian national with over 15 years’ experience of the oil and gas sector. Jesse joined Caithness from the London office of Thomas Weisel Partners, where he was an investment banker in the International Oil & Gas group.

Jesse was previously the Chief Financial Officer for Arsenal Energy Inc., an international exploration company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, which held production assets in Canada and the USA and exploration assets in Egypt, Colombia and Uzbekistan. Prior to that, Jesse was an Analyst at APF Energy Trust.

Jesse qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG in Calgary, where he specialised in oil and gas exploration and production and services. He also holds the ICAEW Corporate Finance qualification and a B.Com. degree from the University of Saskatchewan.

Jacqueline Forbes has been General Manager at Cabre Maroc since 2003, prior to which she was Systems & Data Manager of Anglo Siberian Oil Company plc. Her background is in accountancy and management consultancy, having previously worked for KPMG and REL (now part of the Hackett Group), a global working capital management consultancy.

Jacqueline has an MA Honours degree in French and German from St Andrews University and a postgraduate qualification in European Marketing and Languages.

Anass Costagliola joined Cabre Maroc in 1997, prior to which he was Senior Petroleum Geologist with the Moroccan state oil company, ONAREP (now ONHYM), which he joined as an exploration geologist in 1982, working on detailed in-house and independent studies of petroleum basins across Morocco. He has a PhD in Dynamic and Structural Geology from the University of Marseilles.

Jim McKenny established the US operations of Caithness Petroleum and acquired all its acreage in the Barnett shale play. He has extensive experience in identifying, evaluating, acquiring and managing oil and gas properties in the mid-continent region of the United States. He has an excellent background in geology with extensive land and engineering skills and numerous industry contacts. In particular he has significant experience in conventional as well as unconventional gas resources in the Fort Worth Basin of Texas as well as the Arkoma and Anadarko basins of Oklahoma. Mr McKenny has recently managed properties in the Barnett shale play of North Texas and offshore in the US Gulf of Mexico and Louisiana. Previously he built an oil and gas development project in the city of Oklahoma City from a five person investment firm to an operating company employing 55 people with 15,000 acres and 76 producing directional wells.

Rachel Corfe joined Caithness Petroleum in August 2008. Previously she was Finance Director at SixandCo UK Ltd, a digital media advertising agency which created online advertising campaigns for global blue chip brands, and was instrumental in the UK company reorganisation prior to the group's divergence from its Milan listed parent company.

Rachel has a wealth of diverse business knowledge having worked for both start up and globally listed companies where she also had an active involvement in M&A activities.

Rachel is an Associate Chartered Management Accountant and studied Classics at the University of Liverpool where she obtained her BA Hons degree.