Oil prices settle down 2.5pc

Benchmark crude futures ended Tuesday's session lower, with Brent slipping USD2.69, or 2.6 percent, to USD102.59 a barrel. WTI fell further, sliding USD3.22 or 3.5 percent to USD89.38, as traders responded to signs that Middle Eastern supply is picking up again. Even so, both contracts were on course for monthly gains, with Brent up roughly 13 percent, as worries about disruptions during the US-Israeli war on Iran persisted, Business Recorder reported.

Tanker loadings have restarted at Yanbu on Saudi Arabia's Red Sea coast now that the East-West Pipeline is operating again, trade sources and shipping records indicated. Kpler data showed Middle East crude exports reached 16.328 million barrels per day in September, their strongest level since the war started in late February.

US President Donald Trump insisted he had put nothing on the table for Iran in exchange for ending the war, dismissing press accounts that Washington would unfreeze assets and relax penalties in return for concrete steps on Iran's nuclear programme. Separately, European diesel futures edged lower while US contracts rose 2.6 percent, and the White House has pressed the EU to draw down diesel emergency stocks.