Crude supply to global markets is sufficient and oil price rises have been due to political tensions and refining industry bottlenecks, OPEC President Mohammed al-Hamli said today.
"Supplies to the oil market are sufficient," Hamli told reporters in Abu Dhabi, a day after the International Energy Agency (IEA) said the world needed more oil from OPEC to meet stronger than expected demand.
The IEA, energy adviser to 26 industrialised countries, added weight to consumer nations' calls for OPEC to pump more oil. Officials from OPEC, source of more than a third of the world's oil, have rebuffed consumer concern and said they are supplying enough to meet demand in the 86.1 million barrels per day (bpd) world market. The group agreed last year to curtail its output by 1.7 million bpd.
"The rise in oil prices stems from political tensions in some production regions, speculation in the market and bottlenecks that refineries in consumer nations suffer," said Hamli, who is also the oil minister of the United Arab Emirates. Hamli reiterated that the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries wanted market stability "for the best interest of both producers and consumers".
London Brent crude , currently seen as more representative of the global market than the US benchmark, hit a nine-month high above $71 a barrel on May 24 and was a little below $69 today.
The rise came against the backdrop of continued tensions between the United States and Iran over its nuclear plans, militant attacks on Nigeria's oil installations, and US refinery outages as the summer travel season started.
Hamli reiterated his country's interest in having a nuclear energy programme as part of a Gulf Arab bid to meet rapidly increasing power demand. The Gulf Arab states' plan to start their own nuclear programme has raised fears of an atomic race with Iran.