Saudi Arabia agrees to boost oil production: Trump

Washington, July 1: US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that the King of Saudi Arabia, Salman bin Abdulaziz, has agreed to increase the Arab kingdom’s oil production significantly in order to stop the price of crude from rising. “Just spoke to King Salman of Saudi Arabia and explained to him that, because of the turmoil and disfunction in Iran and Venezuela, I am asking that Saudi Arabia increase oil production, maybe up to 2,000,000 barrels, to make up the difference,” Trump wrote on Twitter.

Last week, Trump urged members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to boost their crude production “substantially” to keep the price down, Efe reported. OPEC and its allies decided last June 22 to raise crude production by a million barrels a day, a volume that, in the medium term, could be more like 600,000 barrels, as a way to control prices that are at their highest since 2014. It’s not yet clear if the increase with which, according to Trump, Saudi Arabia has agreed is in addition to the amount agreed with OPEC, though as Bloomberg reported this week, the state-run oil company Saudi Aramco plans to increase production starting in July to some 10.8 million barrels per day under pressure from the US. (IANS)