VIENNA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- Speculation in the oil market should be "addressed once and for all," Edmund Maduabebe Daukoru, President of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) said here on Monday.

    Daukoru said that the issue of speculation, which has been inflating prices far above market fundamental levels during the present unstable period, should be addressed effectively soon, once and for all, particularly where it involves parties far removed from the day-to-day affairs of the industry.

    Speaking at the opening of the 142nd meeting of the organization, the acting OPEC chairman and Minister of State for Petroleum Resources of Nigeria, said that OPEC is going to hold a joint workshop with the European Union on the impact of financial speculative markets on oil prices, at the OPEC Secretariat in December.

    Though part of the Energy Dialogue OPEC established with the EU last year, the final agreement to proceed with it was taken at the third Ministerial-level meeting in Brussels on June 7, one week after the last OPEC Conference in Caracas, he said.

    It is of particular interest to note that the relationship between crude prices and product prices appears to have diverged recently, with gasoline prices exhibiting greater volatility than crude, he said.

    The OPEC chief said the specific reasons for the recent price peaks were the outbreak of hostilities in Lebanon in the middle of July and fears of hurricanes in the U.S. Gulf closely followed by the sudden shutting-down of the Prudhoe Bay field in Alaska in the first half of August.

    He said that this must be set against the backdrop of volatility that has prevailed in the market for the past two and half years, due principally to concern over the lack of effective global oil refining capacity, anxiety about the ability of oil producers to meet anticipated future oil demand, geopolitical developments in some producing countries and speculation in the oil futures markets. Enditem