PAGE C1 OPEC MAY STEP IN AS PRICES CLIMB The price of oil climbed still higher, reaching $126 a barrel, prompting one OPEC official to suggest that the oil cartel could prick the price bubble.
The 11 OPEC countries, counting Iraq, pump 35 to 40percentt of the world's oil.
The president is also being ridiculed for appointing himself as caretaker oil minister in order to chair the 159th Opec meeting due on 8 June in Vienna.
The public disagreement also underscores that the 12 OPEC member countries are increasingly making their own decisions about production levels rather than bowing to the collective judgment of the group.
The 12 Opec members decided to maintain production at 30 million barrels per day, as first agreed in December 2011.
OPEC Chief Sees Output Hike As Of Feb. 1. OPEC President Abdullah al-Attiyah said he expected any rise in OPEC output quotas to take effect on Feb. 1, and that the hike should be reversed once strike-bound Venezuelan exports resumed.
In such a case, the call on crude from the 12-country Opec oil producers' cartel would drop below 30 million bpd, the IEA said.
It leads the mainly Middle Eastern, 12-member Opec cartel (Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries), and has unique influence over the global oil price.
PAGE A27 SUE OPEC The price of oil is nearly twice as high as it needs to be given the cost of production.
Oil was rising so sharply that in June Saudi Arabia mooted plans to ease soaring prices by increasing output by the 12-strong Opec produders' cartel, of which it is the leading member.
