North European stocks increased, paced by Norwegian state oil giants Statoil and Norsk Hydro.

Teton Energy Corporation ("Teton") (Amex: TEC) announced on May 16th that based on its Chundy pilot area well performance, the Company is ready to proceed with economic development on its 266,572 gross acres in the Denver-Julesburg Basin.

China will make its first crude fill into its second strategic oil storage facility at Aoshan by the end of May, signalling Beijing's determination to bolster its emergency inventories despite high oil prices.

Russia and Syria are in talks on proposals for the development of oil and natural gas fields in Syria.

The 10 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries bound by the group's output agreements produced an average 26.57 million barrels of crude oil per day in April, a Platts survey showed May 10.

Bolivia's president Evo Morales announced that Bolivia reached a deal to purchase the country's only two oil refineries from Petrobras, closing the latest chapter in a year of often-delicate energy dealings between the South American neighbours.

Japan's biggest trading house Mitsubishi Corp., is going to buy a stake in an oil and gas field in the Gulf of Mexico owned by the US' Anadarko Petroleum Corporation.

Russia has offered India a one percent equity stake worth $1 billion in state-controlled oil firm Rosneft, the Financial Express said in an unsourced report on Tuesday.

Gazprom Neft, the oil unit of Russian gas monopoly Gazprom, reported its net profit fall on Friday 24 percent in the first quarter of 2007 from the previous quarter.

A 27% oil recovery rate will help Iran produce 5.2m barrels of oil a day by 2009, the Iranian Planning and Management Institute said.

Crude oil production in April by OPEC countries rose 50,000 barrels a day, or 0.2%.

Boosting its status as one of the top oil producers, China has struck its biggest oil discovery in four decades in Bohai Bay having a reserve of one billion tonnes or about 7.35 billion barrels.