Baghdad The Ministry of Oil announced the election of its Minister, Hayan Abdul-Ghani, as head of the “OAPEC” Council of Ministers, in its new session for the year 2023.

The Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Affairs and Minister of Oil affirmed Iraq’s keenness to activate the role of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries “OAPEC” and the importance of building new visions of cooperation and realistic dealing with the challenges facing global markets and oil-producing countries.

Abdul-Ghani said during his participation in the 109th meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC), which concluded its work in Kuwait today, Monday, according to a statement by the Ministry of Oil, that most of the Arab countries affiliated with the Organization of “OAPEC” represent and constitute a great weight in global oil production. Therefore, it requires a review of its basic system, in order to enable it to play a greater role in achieving its aspirations, in dealing realistically with the challenges facing the oil market, in order to achieve more stability in the global markets.

Abdul-Ghani referred to the most important challenges facing the oil markets, which are “geopolitical”, health, wars and military tensions, explaining that we are working in “OPEC Plus” to mitigate all these influences, stressing that political tensions are one of the factors that exacerbate the problem and harm producers and consumers at the same time, and we must employ oil and energy to bring countries closer together, and spare global markets the repercussions of political conflicts, and that the European-Russian conflict had a negative impact on the stability of higher markets, expressing his hope that the concerned parties would resort to dialogue.

For his part, the Secretary-General of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC), Ali Sabt bin Sabt, said that the Organization’s Council of Ministers held its 109th meeting in the State of Kuwait on the twelfth of December 2022.

Bin Sabt added: “The meeting discussed a set of issues related to the work and activities of the organization, including the draft estimated budget of the organization (the General Secretariat and the Judicial Authority) for the year 2023, and the meeting reviewed the progress made in terms of implementing the plan to activate and develop the organization’s activity approved by the organization’s cabinet, especially in the field of activating the relationship between the General Secretariat of the organization and the Arab companies emanating from it, and the field of activating the role of the organization in training, and the field of coordinating the positions of member states and other countries regarding climate change negotiations and the obligations arising from it, and the field of developing the data bank and activating its role.

The meeting also reviewed the report prepared on the preparations for the Twelfth Arab Energy Conference to be held in the State of Qatar during the last quarter of 2023, and the events and seminars organized by the General Secretariat or participated in it during the year 2022. The meeting also discussed the follow-up to the decision of the Council of Ministers A “4/107” regarding the assignment of the executive office of the organization, in coordination with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, to activate the Green Middle East initiative and adopt the application of the concept of the circular carbon economy.

He explained that the council had also reviewed the economic and technical studies carried out by the General Secretariat, in addition to the reports prepared by the General Secretariat of OAPEC, including the quarterly report on the global petroleum situation, the quarterly report on “developments in liquefied natural gas and hydrogen” and others.

It is noteworthy that the 109th meeting of the OAPEC Council of Ministers was preceded by the 164th meeting of the Executive Office, which was held on December 11, 2022, and it is a meeting dedicated to preparing for the meeting of the Organization’s Council of Ministers.

Source: National Iraqi News Agency