The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies (OPEC+) decided this Sunday to continue applying a cut in oil production in 2023, a measure it defended as "necessary and correct".

At announcementThe alliance, which includes Russia, reiterates that the reduction in production to two million barrels per day, which was announced on October 5, is a "necessary and correct" measure, pointing out that this decision, adopted during a videoconference meeting, is related to "market issues".

At the end of the meeting, Kuwait's new energy minister, Bader al Mulla, quoted by the KUNA news agency, insisted on this and stressed that the impact of slower growth in the economy, skyrocketing inflation and rising interest rates on demand were cause for "continued caution".

The energy ministers of the 23 OPEC+ countries have scheduled a follow-up meeting for February 1, 2023 and a full meeting for June 4 next year. Nevertheless, they expressed their willingness to take "immediate additional measures, if necessary, to deal with market developments and seek the balance of the oil market and its stability".

This decision comes at a time when the market is still assessing the impact of the slowdown in the Chinese economy on demand and just two days after the G7 countries, together with Australia, agreed to a price limit of 60 dollars per barrel for Russian oil, following an agreement reached by the 27 member states of the European Union.

Following this agreement, Russia threatened to stop supplying oil to the European Union. In a post on the social network Twitter, the country's ambassador to the international institutions, Mikhail Ulyanov, said that "as of this year, Europe will live without Russian oil", predicting that the EU bloc will "blame Russia for using oil as a weapon".