WASHINGTONG: Member countries of the International Energy Agency besides the United States have agreed to release 60 million barrels of oil from storage, an official from the US government and an IEA member country official told Reuters.

The amount will be matched by the United States as part of Washington’s pledge last week to tap 180 million barrels of oil from storage, they added.

The massive releases are aimed at cooling prices and easing supply concerns as sanctions and buyer aversion disrupts Russian oil supplies in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.

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“After around the clock diplomacy by the US and of course our allies and partners, the IEA countries have agreed to release an additional 60 million barrels,” a US official said.

“This will be the largest release from both the US and other countries in IEA history. This will supplement our 1 million barrels per day for six months and of course will serve as a bridge until the end of the year when domestic production ramps up.”

The move by the US-allied IEA countries, which represent 31 mostly industrialized countries but not Russia, would be their second coordinated release in a month and would be the fifth in the agency’s history to confront oil market outages.