Vanoil Energy Ltd. announced it has appointed Samuel Malin as director of the company, with immediate effect. Mr. Malin, the founder of Avana Petroleum Limited, brings to Vanoil over 25 years of industry experience, the majority of which is in the region of the western Indian Ocean and East African margin. Previously, he founded Madagascar Oil and Red Island Minerals (RIM) and is the originator of their projects which are the development of multi-billion barrel heavy oil fields and a major coal field respectively.

Mr. Malin, as founder and CEO, built Madagascar Oil from scratch into a $1 1/4 billion dollar company. As RIM's Chairman, Mr. Malin launched a comprehensive appraisal of the Sakoa coal field which resulted in the sale of RIM to PTT-APM for a total of $95 million dollars. Mr. Malin's previous experience includes industry advisory positions for various EU programmes as well as positions with Standard & Poor's/DRI, Arthur D. Little and Dome Petroleum.