OPEC Oil Ministers Focus on Terrorism

VIENNA, Austria –
OPEC oil ministers, most resolved not to cut production levels amid stubbornly high prices, focused Tuesday on political instability, terrorist threats and other factors shaking confidence in the world’s crude markets.

Worries over
Iran’s nuclear ambitions, militant threats in Nigeria and attacks on Middle East facilities

With consensus building among the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries not to lower production, and with crude-oil prices hovering above $62 a barrel, the 11-nation group planned to assess “the influence of new political issues on the oil market,” Qatar’s oil minister, Abdullah bin Hamad al Attiyah, said before Wednesday’s meeting in Vienna.

Attiyah said oil ministers also would discuss demands on the market in the second quarter, a period when demand usually decreases. The International Energy Agency estimates that demand will fall by 2 million barrels a day in the April-June quarter.

AP