Libya's Oil Minister, Dr. Abdulbari Alarusi [Al Arusi] (pictured), has told reporters that he hopes to reopen all oil ports on 10th December and resume full production about a week to ten days later.
Addressing reporters gathered for OPEC's oil output meeting in Vienna on Tuesday, the Minister said:
"We have heard good news from the local people that they are going to attend to the situation ... We don't have any guarantees."
Reuters reports that oil traders and analysts greeted the comments with scepticism, saying that restoration of oil production and exports after a lengthy disruption often took months.
"This looks wildly optimistic," VTB Capital oil strategist Andrey Kryuchenkov said. "I can't see Libya reopening all the ports quickly, and then it would take much longer to get back up to 1.5 million bpd full output."
Arusi added that fellow OPEC members who have been pumping additional oil to compensate for Libya's loss should make way for a return of full output:
"Somebody took our share in the market and we should go back."
(Source: Reuters, NineMSN)
