Oil ups after Iran welcomes drive for output freeze
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Oil prices rose by more than 5 percent to climb above $34 a barrel on Wednesday after Iran voiced its support for an initiative led by Russia and Saudi Arabia to freeze production to boost prices, Reuters reported.
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zangeneh met counterparts from Venezuela, Iraq and Qatar in Tehran for over two hours, after which he welcomed the initiative to set a "ceiling" as a first step toward stabilizing the market.
Zangeneh, quoted by the Shana news agency, did not explicitly say that Iran would keep its own output at January's levels.
An Iranian official earlier said that the country would continue increasing crude output until it reached levels achieved before the imposition of international sanctions.
"Asking Iran to freeze its oil production level is illogical," Iran's OPEC envoy Mehdi Asali was quoted as saying by the Shargh newspaper.
A freeze in production from January's near-record levels would do little to relieve the glut, analysts said.
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