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Iraq supports raising oil production quota to 32 mln barrels a day — deputy minister

OPEC won’t discuss oil production freeze today

VIENNA, June 2. /TASS/. Iraq will support raising oil production quota to 32 mln barrels a day, Deputy Oil Minister, Fayyad Al-Nima told TASS.

When asked what quota Iraq will support, he said:

"32 mln barrels (a day)."

According to him, OPEC won’t discuss oil production freeze today.

"We don’t think that it will be "freeze", it is the "ceiling" that will be discussed," he said.

On December 14, 2011, OPEC decided to increase daily oil production from 29.8 mln to 30 mln barrels from January 1, 2012. At the same time quotas for countries of the organization were not set. As a result the oil price reduced by 3.3% from $109.25 to $105.72. But in early 2012 the prices returned to their previous level. In March-April 2012, Brent crude costs more than $120 per barrel.

After meeting on December 4, 2015 Oil Ministers of OPEC did not take any concrete decision regarding oil production quotas due to the position of the countries, which are non-members of OPEC.

At present, the volume of oil production by OPEC countries is estimated at 31-32 mln barrels a day.

After the meeting of OPEC on December 8, 2015, the price of Brent crude fell below the critical mark of $40 per barrel, first time since 2009.