DOHA, 11 June 2003 — Saudi Arabia yesterday called on OPEC members divided over whether to slash crude production to seek a “consensus of action” at their meeting in Qatar today.

“We need, as usual, to look at the data and assess the market jointly” and seek a “consensus of action and then we will decide and act accordingly,” Saudi Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Ali Al-Naimi told reporters.

Abdullah Al-Attiyah, president of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, said earlier that the 11-member group would consider a cut at today’s meeting in Doha.

“Now is the right time for OPEC to study how to accommodate Iraq, how to make room for Iraq, by, you know, cutting production from others,” said Attiyah, who is also Qatar’s oil minister.

“We should not wait until the crisis comes” before reconsidering the current output ceiling of the group, 25.4 million barrels per day (bpd), he said.

Attiyah, citing Iraqi authorities, said Iraq’s crude production would likely be one million barrels per day and beyond from mid-June.

“Iraq will come to the market. That’s their right ... We have to help them and we also have to make room for them.”

On current price levels, Attiyah said crude was selling within OPEC’s price band mechanism of 22-28 dollars a barrel. “It’s not a high price. It’s still in the band ... We’re working very hard to keep prices within the band,” he said.

But Kuwait called for a rollover of OPEC crude oil production at least until September because prices were satisfactory.

“It’s better to continue with our production because we think we are still in the average price (band),” acting oil minister Sheikh Ahmed Fahd Al-Ahmed Al-Sabah said.

“The latest report was 27 (dollars a barrel). Therefore we are in a good situation. We have to continue ... from now to September,” Sheikh Ahmed said.

“I think we will always have to cooperate with non-OPEC,” he said, adding that the cartel needed the support of independent producers “for the future.”

But non-OPEC Mexico cast doubt on the possibility that oil exporters outside the cartel would automatically join in any cut.

“From our perception the market is going well,” Juan Antonio Barges, undersecretary for hydrocarbons, told AFP here. “I don’t feel a cut (in output) is necessary according to the economic information that we have.”

Omani Oil Minister Mohammed ibn Seif Al-Romhi said, however, that the sultanate, also a non-OPEC state, “would support” a slash in production.