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OPEC Picks Kuwait’s Al-Ghais as Next Top Diplomat

  • Kuwaiti brings three decades of oil industry experience to job
  • Mohammad Barkindo to step down after serving maximum two terms
Haitham al-Ghais 

Haitham al-Ghais 

Photographer: Yasser Al-Zayyat/AFP via Getty Images 

Updated on

OPEC chose veteran Kuwaiti oil executive Haitham al-Ghais to become the organization’s top diplomat, as the group and its allies navigate a delicate recovery from the pandemic.

Al-Ghais -- a multilingual technocrat whose three-decade oil industry career includes stints in Beijing and London -- will become Secretary-General in August, taking over from Mohammad Barkindo, according to a statement from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries on Monday.