Shawdesh desk:

President Joe Biden said Friday that more than 30 countries have joined the United States in tapping national oil reserves to try and settle global energy markets spooked by fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“This morning, over 30 countries from across the world convened in an extraordinary meeting and agreed to the release of tens of millions of additional barrels of oil onto the market,” Biden said in an address from the White House.

On Thursday, Biden announced a record release from the US strategic oil stockpile, pledging a million barrels a day for six months.

The bold measure, by far the biggest use of the strategic stockpile in history, aims to cool down the overheated global oil market and calm inflationary shockwaves ripping through the American economy.

Biden says soaring fuel costs for ordinary Americans are the result of oil price spikes on world markets triggered by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and subsequent Western sanctions against Russia, which is second biggest exporter of crude after Saudi Arabia.

Oil prices steadied Friday, briefly dropping under $100 a barrel.