In an interview with Ahmed Al-Jarallah, Editor-in-Chief of Kuwait's Arab Times newspaper, Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz said his country wants to maintain the price of oil at $25 to $30 per barrel.
"Honestly, we don't want to hurt the international economy. The price of oil should be maintained around $25-30 per barrel to ensure the economies of all the countries, especially the poor ones, aren't affected," the Saudi de-facto leader said. "We have the capacity to satisfy the demand of the market and I assure you we have nothing to do with this price hike," he stressed.
Abdullah held "certain huge oil firms" responsible for the rise in the price of oil in the international market. He accused them of hoarding huge quantities of oil and manipulating its price, noting "Saudi Arabia has nothing to do with this development. This is the market trend and we have to go along with it." He added "we never wanted the price to cross the $30 barrier." (menareport.com)
© 2004 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
