COPEC
 COPEC Headquarters in Agnannet | |
| State-owned enterprise | |
| Industry | Oil and gas |
| Founded | July 6, 1996 |
| Founder | Jelal Medan |
| Headquarters | Agnannet, Charnea |
Key people | Aghu Rasul (CEO) |
| Products | Fuel and petrochemicals |
| Owner | Charnea |
Number of employees | 127,110 (2018) |
The Charnean Oil and Petrochemical Corporation, better known as COPEC, is the state owned petroleum company of Charnea. COPEC is the largest employer and most profitable single enterprise in Charnea, and provides roughly half of all government revenue for the Second Empire regime. Charnea is a member of the Association of Oil Producing Nations and simultanously posseses one of the largest explored reserves in the world while remaining the AOPN nation with the most unproven resevoirs. At the peak of production in the earlt to mid 2000s, COPEC was one of the largest net exporters of oil and petrochemical products in the world due to an astronomical level of production combined with minimal domestic demand. However, COPEC has suffered significantly from under-funding and problems with vulernable infrastructure due to political instability and violence in Charnea, resulting in a long term decline in output that has further impacted the Charnean economy and state treasury. The new regime in Charnea under Tamenokalt Amina N'Okha announced in summer 2021 the beginning of a ten year plan to rebuild and restore COPEC assets and operations across the country in an effort to return to previous peak output by 2031.
History
COPEC was first established in 1996 by the president of the Central Scipian Republic, Baseel Madoun through the nationalization of the oil and gas industry which involved the expropriation of all existing foreign and domestic private oil companies operating in Charnea at the time. The foundation of COPEC was surrounded in international controversy over the expropration, but was also instrumental in financing the reconstruction of the Central Scipian Republic which had just months prior made peace with Fahran and Alanahr, concluding the ten year Ninvite War that had devastated much of the country. Pivotal to the rule of President Madoun, the job of managing this new endeavor was given to long time Madoun loyalist Jelal Medan, a business graduate from the University of Koros in southern Charnea. Medan proved effective at building the business, importing talent from the Mutul in order to rapidly expand operations. The company began to decline after Baseel Madoun's death in 2008 and the removal of Jelal Medan in 2009 as a result of political maneuvering by competing forces in the Madounist faction of the republic. COPEC would go on to suffer greatly during the ensuing instability and the Transition Conflict that broke up the political integrity of Charnea and ended the rule of the Central Scipian Republic. Competing factions and warlords seized parts of the COPEC extraction and refining infrastructure for themselves in order to fund their efforts, while the surviving pieces of the company no longer had a clear legitimate state to serve as its owner.
Many COPEC assets were acquired and consolidated by Aghu Rasul, an opportunistic businessman in league with the Cobalt Square and the Northern Government. Rasul would hand over control of these assets, effectively restoring COPEC under the Northern Government, in exchange for the position of CEO of the company which he has retained to the present day. As CEO, Rasul has overseen the gradual reconstruction of COPEC operations through the winding down and eventual end of the Transition Conflict, and is indirectly responsible for funding many of the endeavors of the new Charnean regime. Because of this, Aghu Rasul is one of the most influencial people associated with the new regime and the only notable figure of the national leadership belonging to neither the Cobalt Square nor the Okha dynasty.