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Putin discusses aspects of extending OPEC + deal with Russia’s Security Council

On June 22-23, OPEC + participants will meet in Vienna to discuss options for further implementation of the transaction

MOSCOW, June 15. /TASS/. President Vladimir Putin discussed aspects of extending the OPEC + deal with the permanent members of Russia’s Security Council, the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday.

Putin also touched upon the meetings he had with his foreign counterparts in recent days, Peskov said.

Read also

Putin hails Russia-OPEC cooperation

"During the meeting, the president informed the participants about the SCO summit in China on June 9-10, as well as about his contacts with foreign leaders on the margins of this forum," Peskov said.

"The extension of the OPEC + deal was also touched upon in the context of the President's contacts with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammad bin Salman Al Saud," the spokesman said.

He added that at the meeting of the national Security Council also key issues of Russia's social and economic development were discussed.

The meeting was attended by Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Speaker of the State Duma (lower house of parliament) Vyacheslav Volodin, Kremlin administration head Anton Vaino, Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Head if the national security service (FSB) Alexander Bortnikov, chief of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Sergei Naryshkin, as well as the President's special representative for environmental protection, ecology and transport Sergei Ivanov.

On June 22-23, OPEC + participants will meet in Vienna to discuss options for further implementation of the transaction, including mitigation of the existing restrictions.

In late 2016, OPEC member-states and 11 independent oil-exporting countries, including Russia, entered into an agreement to reduce oil production. According to that agreement, during the first half of 2017 the participants were to withdraw 1.8 million barrels per day from the oil market in comparison with the level of October 2016. The agreement is valid from the beginning of 2017 and has been extended twice, most recently until the end of 2018.

The deal made it possible to raise oil prices that fell below $30 per barrel in 2016, and to reduce the surplus of world oil reserves to an average of five years' level.

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