But not all the overseas investment deals being made on the back of rising oil prices are welcome - at least so far as the West's security interests are concerned - as highlighted by this week's report by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), a defence policy think tank.
Nuclear Programmes in the Middle East: In the Shadow of Iran found that between February 2006 and January 2007, at least 13 countries in the Middle East had announced new or revived plans to develop nuclear programmes, the purpose of which were, ostensibly, to meet their future civilian energy needs.
23 May 2008: Daily Telegraph
By Con Coughlin
With oil prices topping $135 a barrel yesterday, you might imagine the one part of the world that is not desperately searching for new energy sources would be the Middle East.
While Western governments have been thrown into paroxysms of economic angst over soaring oil prices, those countries lucky enough to contain an abundance of this liquid gold have never had it so good.
It was not so long ago - the turn of the century, in fact - when prices were struggling to rise above $10 a barrel, and there were mutterings about the ability of some of the world's largest oil producers to survive the dramatic turn-around in their economic fortunes.
Autocratic regimes, such as that presided over by Saudi Arabia's ruling family, for example, have always been able to counter calls for greater democracy and fiscal accountability by showering the populace with oil-financed largesse.
But when the good times ended, and serious questions were asked about where all the money had gone, there were fears that many of these governments might fall. Rather as Gordon Brown is discovering in Britain today.
Now the tables have been turned, and while Mr Brown struggles to come to terms with the implications of soaring energy costs, the economic fortunes of the world's main oil producers have been transformed.
Not since the heyday of the politically motivated Opec price rise in the 1970s, when Arab oil producers sought to punish the West for supporting Israel during the 1973 Yom Kippur war, has the region been so awash with petro-dollars.
Apart from the usual sharp increase in conspicuous spending, with orders for top-of-the-range Rolls-Royces and Bentleys exceeding supply, Arab governments are investing in multi-billion-dollar domestic construction projects, while at the same time desperately looking for promising overseas investment opportunities.
But not all the overseas investment deals being made on the back of rising oil prices are welcome - at least so far as the West's security interests are concerned - as highlighted by this week's report by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), a defence policy think tank.
Nuclear Programmes in the Middle East: In the Shadow of Iran found that between February 2006 and January 2007, at least 13 countries in the Middle East had announced new or revived plans to develop nuclear programmes, the purpose of which were, ostensibly, to meet their future civilian energy needs.
However, the fact that this sudden revival of interest in nuclear energy coincided with the Iranian government's decision to resume work on its uranium-enrichment programme is hardly unrelated.
The West might be alarmed at the prospect of the mullahs arming themselves with nuclear weapons, but it is the Arabs who are first in their direct line of fire.
Relations between Tehran and the Saudis have been strained ever since Iran's Revolutionary Guards were implicated in the 1996 bombing of the US Marine base in Dhahran, which killed 19 people.
Of all the world's nations, the Saudis, with their vast oil reserves, have little use for nuclear energy.Yet, as the IISS report makes clear, they regard the possibility of an Iranian nuclear weapon as a direct threat to their existence, and have now revived a nuclear programme that would give them the ability to develop their own arsenal.
Nor is it just those countries that are in close proximity to Iran that have suddenly rediscovered an interest in matters nuclear. Algeria, which is hardly in Tehran's direct line of fire, has taken advantage of the $81 billion increase in this year's oil revenues to open negotiations with China on a nuclear pact.
It is Egypt, though, whose revived interest in nuclear energy is causing the most concern and which could cause a radical shift in the regional balance of power. Dr John Chipman, director of the IISS, this week ascribed Egypt's renewed interest to "concerns about the balance of power and loss of relative status and influence in the region" if Iran had a bomb.
Egypt - one of the few Arab powers that is not endowed with vast oil wealth - has been a key Western ally in the region since it signed the Camp David peace treaty with Israel in 1979, and is consequently the recipient of billions of dollars of American military aid.
Washington, quite sensibly, has discouraged Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak from entertaining any nuclear ambitions, as they might threaten neighbouring Israel, which, with a formidable nuclear arsenal, is America's favoured regional proxy.
But Washington's failure to curb Iran's nuclear programme has prompted Mr Mubarak to take the risky step of negotiating a deal with Russia to build a number of nuclear power stations.
Russia, of course, has played a key role in helping with the development of Iran's nuclear programme, and the fact that Egypt has also agreed to procure a wide range of Russian weapons has raised suspicions - particularly in Washington - that the nuclear deal between Cairo and Moscow is not just about developing nuclear power.
But in a sense the controversy over Egypt's nuclear ambitions is just the tip of the iceberg. What the IISS report makes clear is that if Iran does achieve its goal of acquiring a nuclear weapons arsenal, the rest of the region will quickly follow. And then we will all have a lot more to worry about than the rising costs of oil.
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