ABU DHABI: The United Arab Emirates said on Tuesday that Opec will no longer move to shore up crude prices, arguing that rising North American shale oil output needed to be curbed.
World prices have been falling since June but the pace of the slide accelerated in November when the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) decided to maintain its production unchanged at 30 million barrels per day.
Analysts say that richer cartel members like the UAE have been ready to accept the price fall in the hope that it will force higher-cost shale producers out of the market.
“We cannot continue to be protecting a certain price,” UAE Energy Minister Suhail al-Mazrouei said.
“We have seen the oversupply, coming primarily from shale oil, and that needed to be corrected,” he told participants in the Gulf Intelligence UAE Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi.
Mazrouei said the UAE remains “concerned” about balance in the oil markets but “cannot under any circumstances be the only party responsible.”
Published in Dawn January 14th , 2015
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