Iran's oil minister said Saturday that the falling value of the dollar has contributed to instability in the oil market, and rising production costs could reduce investment in the oil sector and undermine energy supply security, the semi-official Fars News Agency reported Saturday.
"The oil market at the moment is very stormy and part of these changes are resulting from the jump in the exchange rate of the dollar and euro, or the sudden drop in the value of the dollar versus the euro," Gholam Hossein Nozari said, according to Fars.
The Iranian oil minister said commodity, engineering, consulting and contractor costs had increased 2.5 times during the past year and a half, reported Fars.
"If the price of oil reaches a level that could damage production, energy supply security will definitely be faced with problems in the future," Fars cited Nozari as saying.
"The price of oil must reach a price in world markets (with which) it can find stability, in order to establish a basis for investment in countries endowed with reserves," Nozari said, according to Fars.
The Iranian oil minister also suggested that political problems between Russia and the United States regarding the former's military conflict with Georgia could also be affecting oil prices.
"Maybe the cold war that has also begun at the international level is not without effect on the oil market," Nozari said, reported Fars.