London, Dec. 14 (AFP): The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) will announce its plans this week to slash output to lift crude prices weighed down by a slide in energy demand.

Opec will convene a meeting on Wednesday in Oran, Algeria, where it is expected to announce plans to cut its oil output quota for the third time since September.

Iran will be pressing for a cut at the meeting, the ISNA news agency reported today.

“Our position in the upcoming Opec meeting in Algeria is a cut of 1.5-2 million barrels per day in Opec’s quota output,” Iranian oil minister Gholam Hossein Nozari said.

Analysts are forecasting a cut of between one million barrels and two million barrels from Opec’s official daily output quota of 27.3 million barrels, excluding Iraq.

Julian Jessop, the chief analyst at consultancy Capital Economics, said they would probably have their way.