Venezuela Against Iraq Voice at OPEC

VIENNA - The leader of Venezuela's delegation to OPEC said Monday it was unacceptable for Iraq to attend this week's OPEC output policy talks in anything but an informal way.

Speaking as he arrived in Vienna, Venezuela's energy minister, Rafael Ramirez, said Iraq should not be in a position to influence decisions at the meeting because Iraq's government is not recognized by the U.N.

Informal talks, he said, were acceptable, but "we won't accept under any circumstances" official Iraqi attendance.

"Our position is clear. Venezuela hopes to have Iraq included within OPEC, but the internal situation of Iraq should be resolved, and there should be recognition by the U.N.," Ramirez said.

"We think it is not convenient to have Iraq included," he said. "It is healthy to wait until there is U.N. recognition."

Asked whether his delegation would quit the meeting if Iraq is allowed to attend in an official capacity, he said: "We will have to discuss that. But I think there will be a consensus, as usual."

Ramirez also said there would be no change to the group's output ceiling of 25.4 million barrels a day.

Thats fine. OPEC is not a particularly relevant organization in any case. Iraq's presence at the meeting is of some value, its always good to schmooze your counterparts in your primary business, but no one should ever imagine that OPEC is going to do anything important.

OPEC is a club for bankrupt centralized economies. All of them are on the edge of disaster economically, all of them are trying to increase production while simultaneously trying to convince their colleagues to restrain theirs. They agree to production cuts they don't intend to honor. Real production cuts are usually announced to cover maintenance problems, and usually disappear when the situation returns to normal.

OPEC can not manage more than temporary spikes in the price of oil without losing market share, particularly in a world where the largest untapped sources of oil lie in non-OPEC countries.

The only way for them to restrain production without losing market share is to seed terrorism in non-OPEC countries. There is some evidence that at least one OPEC country is engaged in this, which leads to a chicken-egg question. Is Wahab subversion in Central Asia motivated purely by toxic religious psychosis, with the oil reserves being merely a coincidental issue, or is it one of those delicious situations in which you can pursue your strategic economic needs while spreading your ideology and influence?

That one OPEC country should be viewed as a Pirate Kingdom. The rest are economic illiterates.

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