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2022 in review: The year that broke US relations with OPEC+

After a tumultuous year for US-Saudi ties, there is little reason to expect US-OPEC+ tensions to ease in 2023.
US President Joe Biden (L) and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (R) arrive for the family photo during the Jeddah Security and Development Summit (GCC+3) at a hotel in Saudi Arabia's Red Sea coastal city of Jeddah on July 16, 2022. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Last October, OPEC+, a group of 23 oil-producing countries including Saudi Arabia and Russia that controls 40% of world oil production, announced that it would cut production by 2 million barrels per day — roughly equivalent to 2% of the world’s oil supplies. The group said that the production quota would continue for 14 months until the end of 2023 and attributed the cuts to the “uncertainty that surrounds the global economic and oil market outlooks.” 

US President Joe Biden immediately condemned the decision, arguing that the production cuts amounted to an economic lifeline to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war effort in Ukraine. Biden’s administration took particular issue with the role of Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil producer and de facto leader of OPEC+, and vowed “consequences.” 

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