Iran 'trying to inflict more damage on global economy' says Teesside politics expert
The world's energy watchdog is releasing of millions of oil reserve barrels
A politics expert in Teesside says the war in the Middle East could bring about changes to inflation and the cost of living.
Earlier this week, Iran's military command warned the world should prepare for fuel costs to double.
Around the world, oil prices have briefly jumped above $100 again - despite the world's energy watchdog announcing the release of millions of reserve barrels.
It follows new Iranian attacks on ships in the Middle East - including two tankers off Iraq.
Dr Haian Dukhan, Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Teesside University, said: "We should be overly optimistic as well about when this is going to be over because it could still take another like one or two weeks, I guess, depending on how kind of the military operations on the ground like continue over the coming few days.
"Iran has been working on its nuclear program for a long time and there were lots of negotiations between the Iranians and between the Americans, which led to signing a deal when Obama was in power and then Trump came and revoked this deal. So it was kind of expected. There was some sort of like build up there.
"I think what came as a surprise to all analysts is that the Iranian regime has shown more resilience, despite the fact that the top leaders have been assassinated, they have been able to appoint another supreme leader, and now they're trying to inflict more damage on the global economy to increase the cost of the war and push the Americans towards ending it.
"The global economy is dependent really on the economy of the Arab Gulf region. There is a large British community that lives in the Arab Gulf region, so we might see some of them like coming back here. I think kind of probably the main concern in general is the influx of refugees from Iran towards Europe in a similar way to what happened in Syria in 2015."
Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, said: "The oil market challenges we are facing are unprecedented in scale, therefore I am very glad that IEA Member countries have responded with an emergency collective action of unprecedented size.
"Oil markets are global so the response to major disruptions needs to be global too. Energy security is the founding mandate of the IEA, and I am pleased that IEA Members are showing strong solidarity in taking decisive action together.”
The IEA added its 32 members hold emergency stockpiles of over 1.2 billion barrels, with a further 600 million barrels of industry stocks held under government obligation. The coordinated stock release is the sixth in the history of the IEA, which was created in 1974. Previous collective actions were taken in 1991, 2005, 2011, and twice in 2022.
The conflict in the Middle East that began on 28 February 2026 has impeded oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz, with export volumes of crude and refined products currently at less than 10% of pre-conflict levels. This is forcing operators across the region to shut in or curtail a substantial amount of production.
An average of 20 million barrels per day of crude oil and oil products transited the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, or around 25% of the world’s seaborne oil trade. Options for oil flows to bypass the Strait of Hormuz are limited.