Rice has worked to support and expand relations with the oil-rich African nation.
Small wonder, then, that oil-rich nations like Iraq and Venezuela are poor or in decline.
But the men in power may not be prepared to resist the temptations that have overwhelmed some other oil-rich nations.
Cultural affairs in this oil-rich nation of 24 million people are supervised by the same ministry that is responsible for education and sports.
Some suspect the involvement of the French government, who they say was determined to control this oil-rich nation.
Russia has stepped in, sweeping aside questions about why an oil-rich nation needed a nuclear power program.
They formed an alliance with the oil-rich nations who then joined the venture as financial partners.
The oil-rich nations no longer had the resources available to them to continue financing the L5 construction.
Few Western leaders complain because he is seen as the guarantor of stability in an oil-rich nation.
Until world oil prices began to slide in the early 1980's, Venezuela was almost a caricature of an oil-rich nation.