Russia Says Cannot Affect Oil Prices Short Term

PRAGUE, Sep 26, 2000 -- (Reuters) Russia cannot increase oil output enough to strongly influence world markets in the next month or two, Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin said on Monday.

"We cannot strongly raise oil output at present," he told reporters on the sidelines of the World Bank/International Monetary Fund meeting.

"Russia does not have short term measures which would strongly affect the situation (on oil markets) in the next month or two."

He spoke two days after saying Russia was ready to join international anti-crisis efforts to stabilize oil prices.

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-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), September 27, 2000

Answers

I kind of thought this was the case. Even overstated. It's been well known that they've had trouble for many months meeting their current export contracts.

-- JackW (jpayne@webtv.net), September 27, 2000.