Fate of 500,000 Barrels of Oil at Stake After Saudi Royal Talks
- Fields jointly owned by two countries halted output years ago
- Saudis need fields to reach 12.5 million barrel-a-day capacity
Photographer: FAYEZ NURELDINE/AFP/Getty Images
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The Saudi crown prince held talks with Kuwait’s ruler about increasing cooperation on oil policies. In the shadows of their discussions lies the fate of two jointly owned fields that can produce half a million barrels a day of crude and help OPEC fill a possible supply gap.
Khafji and Wafra, the fields located in the shared Neutral Zone between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, are crucial for the kingdom to meet its official production ceiling of 12.5 million barrels a day of oil. State-owned Saudi Arabian Oil Co., the world’s biggest exporter known also as Aramco, directly controls 12 million barrels of daily Saudi output.