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LONDON: Oil prices rose further on Friday amid
tensions over crude producer Iran and at the end of an extremely
volatile week of trading.
Brent North Sea oil for August
delivery jumped by $1.64 to $143.67 a barrel in electronic deals.
New York’s main oil contract,
light sweet crude for August delivery, won $1.80 to settle at
$143.45.
Traders said oil prices had shot
higher on Thursday, rising by almost $6 a barrel, on the back of
simmering geopolitical tensions over key producer Iran and lingering
worries over stretched global crude supplies.
On Monday, crude futures had
dived below $140 a barrel on strengthening US currency.
A strong dollar makes
dollar-priced crude more expensive for buyers using weaker
currencies, dampening demand for oil.
Oil blazed a record-breaking
trail last week, driven by geopolitical tensions over Iran, a weaker
US dollar and tightening global supplies, traders said.
Traders on Friday continued to
track events concerning Iran, the second-biggest crude oil producer
of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) with an
output of about four million barrels per day. Other reports peg the
output to 2.4 million barrels a day.
Fueling this concern is Iran’s
test-firing more missiles on Thursday, ignoring global concern over
its launch of a broadside of missiles amid efforts to end a dispute
over its nuclear program.
The White House played down the
risk of war between Iran and the United States, despite the Iranian
missile tests and some tough talk by US State Secretary Condoleezza
Rice.
Rice warned Iran that Washington
had beefed up its security presence in the Gulf and would not
hesitate to defend its ally Israel, as Iran insisted its nuclear
drive is aimed solely at generating energy.
Some Western nations fear
Iran’s moves could be aimed at making an atomic bomb and have
called for a freeze of uranium enrichment.
Iran said Friday that its top
nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and EU foreign policy chief Javier
Solana would hold talks on ending the atomic standoff on July 19 in
Geneva, the official IRNA news agency reported.
OPEC would not be able to replace
Iran’s oil production if supplies were halted in case of a war
with Israel or the United States, the oil cartel’s chief has said.
Iran to hike output
Iran assures the world public
that it will soon hike its oil export. In Tehran, Iranian Oil
Minister Gholam-Hossein Nozari said Iran will raise oil export to
3.5 million barrels a day by end-March 2010, Iran’s satellite
Press TV reported Friday.
“Iran’s oil export level will
be raised to 3.5 million barrels a day from the current 2.4 million
barrels a day by the end of the current development plan,” Nozari
told reporters Thursday, as he denied an allegation that the country
will not be able to export oil because of high internal consumption.
Asked about the recent decision
by OPEC to keep the current production level, Nozari said the market
is supplied with enough crude, but consumers should increase
investment in the producer countries to help them boost oil
production.
Iran earlier announced in May
that it would boost the oil output to 4.3 million barrels per day by
end-March 2009.
But OPEC has cut its estimate for
world crude demand over the next two decades, predicting that high
prices would compel consumer countries to be more efficient in their
use of the precious commodity.
2009 outlook
Meanwhile, the International
Energy Agency has forecast that tension on oil markets was set to
ease early next year, amid an economic slowdown in the United
States.
The price of oil set a record
high above $146 per barrel on July 3 owing to falling reserves of US
crude, simmering tensions over Iran and a weak dollar, traders said.
Record oil prices have sparked
protests worldwide as people struggle to cope with the ramped up
costs of petrol, jet fuel and domestic electricity and gas.
--AFP with Xinhua
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