Word: yamani
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Traitor!" screamed the Iranian press. "Stooge for capitalism!" The target of that wrath, Saudi Arabian Oil Minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani, smoothly replied with just about the worst possible insult in the Islamic world. He implied that the eleven members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, who have announced a two-stage increase of 15% in the world price of oil, v. the 5% increase posted by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, are playing into the hands of Israel. Said Yamani: "Israel has an interest in higher prices because they push the West to find alternative sources...
Behind the closed steel shutters in the Gulfs giant banquet hall, which served as conference room, almost no one really took him seriously. "We listened respectfully to Yamani's proposals though we did not accept them," said one oil minister. When the other OPEC chieftains failed to buy his reasoning, Yamani dramatically rose from the conference table and strode out of the hall. He flew to Riyadh for talks with King Khalid ibn Abdul Aziz. The other oil ministers pretended to be unimpressed by Yamani's theatrics. Said Iraq's oil minister, Karim...
Upon his return, Yamani clearly had the King's O.K. to accept no more than a 5% increase. That, Yamani explained, would effectively freeze present market prices, which have crept above OPEC's "marker" prices as oil companies stockpiled supplies in anticipation of a big oil-price increase. The real bargaining sessions switched from the formal banquet hall to half-a-dozen or so smoke-filled suites where the various oil ministers were trying to strike deals and line up support. At 2 a.m. on Friday, Valentin Hernándes, the amiable Venezuelan oil minister, telephoned waiting reporters...
Caustic Remarks. Yamani did not even bother to attend the final session in the conference hall. Instead, smiling and gracious, he invited TIME Correspondent Wilton Wynn and a handful of other reporters to his tenth-floor suite. There, in equable tones, he delivered some surprisingly caustic remarks about his OPEC colleagues. How did he feel about breaking ranks? "Is it fair for all OPEC to get together to decide the price of Saudi crude? Is it fair for others to decide against our will?" What about OPEC arguments that a big oil hike is justified by inflation in the prices...
...change. Four American companies−Exxon, Texaco. Mobil and Chevron−that import heavily from Saudi Arabia will be able to undersell such other producers as Shell, British Petroleum and Compagnie Française des Petroles, which rely more heavily on the higher-priced OPEC states. All in all. Yamani seems to have touched off a classic capitalist price war. That is scarcely what cartels are supposed to do. and OPEC least of all; its increases were once heralded as the start of a "new economic order." But that was before Qatar turned out to be Splitsville...