No Alternative to Iran Oil on World Market
One month has passed since the United States re-imposed sanctions on Iran’s oil sector, initially claimed to be aiming at zeroing Iran’s oil exports. In the meantime, some OPEC members plus non-OPEC oil producer Russia lifted their oil output.
But as oil prices declined, Saudi Arabia announced after the 11th Joint OPEC-non-OPEC Ministerial Monitoring Committee (JMMC) that it would reduce its oil supply by 500,000 b/d in December month-on-month.
Mohsen Qamsari, who served as deputy CEO of National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) for international affairs, and was directly involved in oil export for two decades, tells "Iran Petroleum" that Iran’s oil exports would never be cut to zero.
He notes that there is no alternative to Iran’s oil in global markets despite a recent attempt by Saudi Arabia and Russia to increase their oil supply to fill void left by US sanctions on Iran’s oil.
The following is the full text of the interview Qamsari gave to "Iran Petroleum":
Some believe that the US has imposed tougher ever sanctions on Iran and will reach its goal of reducing Iran’s oil exports to zero. What do you think? Is that possible?
That’s by no means possible. We don’t take this round of US sanctions very seriously. They are trade sanctions imposed [unilaterally] by the US. Before signing the JCPOA (Iran’s nuclear deal with six world powers), the sanctions were politically motivated, which had been endorsed by the UN Security Council. This time, the US has unilaterally enforced sanctions on Iran. And you can see that US President Donald Trump’s remarks show that the sanctions were targeting trade and the US is open to deal. After quitting the JCPOA, the Americans said they would cut Iran’s oil exports to zero, but sanctions have taken effect and Iran’s oil exports has not and will not be zeroed.