To the Shareholders and Board of Directors of International Briquettes Holding In our opinion, the accompanying consolidated balance sheets and the related consolidated statements of operations, changes in shareholders' equity and cash flows present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of International Briquettes Holding and its subsidiaries at September 30, 1999 and 1998, and the results of their operations and their cash flows for each of the three fiscal years in the period ended September 30, 1999, in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States of America. These financial statements are the responsibility of the Company's management; our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements based on our audits. We conducted our audits of these statements in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States of America, which require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement. An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements, assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, and evaluating the overall financial statement presentation. We believe that our audits provide a reasonable basis for our opinion. The Company is a member of a group of affiliated companies and, as indicated in Note 4, has extensive transactions and relationships with members of the group. Because of these relationships, it is possible that the terms of these transactions are not the same as those that would result from transactions among wholly unrelated parties. ESPIÑEIRA, SHELDON Y ASOCIADOS Carlos González G. CPC 21291 Caracas, Venezuela November 10, 1999