ACTING Opec president Chakib Khelil of Algeria on Tuesday appeared to rule out an increase in oil production in the near future. “We can see that oil reserves are currently at their highest level, that there is a lot of crude on the market and sufficient petrol despite the halt in Iraq’s exports of crude,” said Khelil, Algeria’s minister for Energy and Mines. “Obviously, in the short term, there is uncertainty surrounding the Iraqi crude, but for the time being Opec has no worries and there is no reason to increase production,” he added. The next ministerial meeting of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, set for Vienna in early July, foresees “no major problems as far as production quotas or price is concerned”. – AFP