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‘OPEC’ asks the ‘IEA’ …stop releasing all that ‘Black Gold’
Eric Watkins, OGJ Oil Diplomacy Editor
LOS ANGELES, June 28 — Abdullah El-Badri, secretary general of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, urged the International Energy Agency to reverse its earlier decision to release 60 million bbl of oil over the coming 30 days.
“I hope this practice will be stopped and stopped immediately,” El-Badri told a news conference in Vienna after the scheduled 8th ministerial-level meeting of the energy dialogue between OPEC and the European Union.
“We don’t see a good reason to release this quantity, and I hope the IEA will refrain from using this practice,” El-Badry said, also telling the Kuwait News Agency that IEA had wronged OPEC with its decision to release the oil.
“The agency did not give OPEC an opportunity to increase its output before deciding to draw from the strategic reserves of its 28 members,” he said, noting that such a move is justifiable only as “a final resort in extreme emergencies” and not to control prices.
“As international organizations, IEA, which represents the interests of consumers, and OPEC, which represents producers, have to work together for the stability of the market and to maintain fair prices,” El-Badri said.
His remarks were in line with those of Iran’s OPEC Gov. Mohammad Ali Khatibi who blasted the IEA’s decision to release the strategic reserves as a politically motivated intervention in “the ordinary function” of the oil market.
