Commentaries, Analysis, And Editorials -- December 20, 2017

Saudi Arabia's Oil Minister Khalid al-Falih addresses a news conference after an OPEC meeting in Vienna, Austria, November 30, 2017. REUTERS/Heinz-Peter Bader

Rania El Gamal, Katie Paul, Reuters: Saudi energy minister: Premature to discuss changes in OPEC-led pact

RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia’s energy minister said it is premature to discuss any changes to the OPEC-led supply cut pact as market rebalancing is unlikely to happen until the second half of 2018 even with the current outage of the North Sea Forties pipeline.

Any potential exit from current cuts would be done gradually once the market returns to balance but drawing down inventories will still take more time, Khalid al-Falih told Reuters on Wednesday.

“We haven’t seen any major declines in inventories that we didn’t expect. As we said last month, we still have approximately 150 million barrels of overhang, and it is going to take the second half 2018 to draw that down,” Falih said.

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Commentaries, Analysis, And Editorials -- December 20, 2017

How ISIS Members Fled The Caliphate, Perhaps To Fight Another Day -- BuzzFeed

Saudi Arabia Unveils Its 2018 Budget: Economists’ Reaction -- Zainab Fattah, Bloomberg

What it Means for Xi to Abandon North Korea -- Don Tse & Larry Ong, RCD

Why Chinese province is warning citizens of nuclear war -- Nikkei Asian Review

Libya in grip of chaos two years after unity deal -- AFP

Zimbabwe's Military Ends Intervention, But Nation's Economic Challenges Remain -- Mariama Diallo, VOA

Macron steers France to a new Mideast role -- Maysam Behravesh, Reuters

Why Russia and the West can't get along -- Kim Traill, ABC News Online

Catalonia set to vote with separatists in jail, exile -- Creede Newton, AL Jazeera

How Italy turned Euroskeptic -- Naomi O'Leary, Politico

Chile Gives Sebastian Pinera a Second Chance -- John Londregan, Weekly Standard

The real story in Puerto Rico -- CSM Editorial

Trudeau vs. Singh Is Next Battle for Hearts of Canada’s Left -- Josh Wingrove, Bloomberg

Podcast: Hezbollah’s Narco-Terror Nexus in Latin America -- Threat Matrix

Bitcoin and the Value of Financial Freedom -- Leonid Bershidsky, Bloomberg

Want War with North Korea? Better Ask Congress. -- Daniel L. Davis, National Interest