UK: Brown calls for global talks to tackle oil and food price crisis

Gordon Brown promised yesterday that he would make the high prices of oil and food important areas of discussion in the forthcoming EU Council in Brussels and the G8 Summit scheduled for early July. Mr Brown also said that later this month he will jointly launch a summit in Saudi Arabia with King Abdullah on the oil crisis.

Mr Brown told reporters at his monthly press conference that “we will continue to work closely with the Saudi government to bring oil prices down to sustainable levels. This can only be done through dialogue. I have proposed to the King that, if necessary, I will be happy to convene a follow-up summit at heads of government level, and have offered London as a venue.”

…Yesterday a bleak short-term outlook for oil supply was confirmed by Chakib Khelil, president of Opec and the Algerian oil minister, who ruled out the possibility that the group will raise output to curb record prices when it meets consuming nations in Saudi Arabia later this month. “Supply is more than enough, there won’t be a change,” he said.

Independent