Russia has played an extremely important role in maintaining stability in the oil market, Haitham Al Ghais of Kuwait, Secretary-General of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), said in an interview with Bloomberg on Wednesday.
"The Russians have played a vital role in keeping the market stable," he said.
According to the OPEC secretary-general, Russia's membership in OPEC+ cannot hinder the organization's dialogue with the United States. "We [OPEC] are in dialogue with a lot of parties. We are in dialogue with China, we are in dialogue with India, with Russia, with the EU. I am open to dialogue with the US as well," he said, responding to the host's question about whether Russia's participation in OPEC+ would be an obstacle to OPEC negotiations with Washington.
Al Ghais added that the OPEC+ ministerial conference held earlier on August 3 made it clear that the association has a "very close relationship" with Russia. Since the meeting of OPEC representatives took place quickly, the official continued, on this basis it could be stated that there was "no split" between the countries of the organization, and the final decision was taken unanimously.
OPEC+ participants on August 3 approved an increase in oil production in September by 100 thousand barrels per day (bpd), while Russia and Saudi Arabia will be able to raise oil production by 26 thousand bpd each, to 11.03 million bpd. The total level of oil production of the alliance countries may increase up to 43.955 mln bpd. The final communiqué stresses that the world's spare oil production capacity is severely limited and should be used carefully. In addition, OPEC noted that chronic underinvestment in the oil sector has reduced excess production capacity. The next OPEC+ meeting will be held on September 5.
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Based on materials from TASS