Tehran (Platts)--17Apr2013/255 am EDT/655 GMT

Iran's current oil production capacity stands at 4.2 million b/d and the OPEC nation favors an oil price of $100-120/barrel, which it considers fair to both producers and consumers, the oil ministry's spokesman said Wednesday.

Alireza Nikzad Rahbar also told reporters on the sidelines of an oil and gas show in Tehran that Iran had no problem selling its crude oil but that it did have some crude in storage. He declined to provide a figure for current production saying: "We are producing as much as the market can manage."

"We have strategic inventory to manage the market but that doesn't mean that we don't have customers," he said.

Asked what price level Iran would be aiming for at the next OPEC meeting on May 31, Nikzad Rahbar replied: "A reasonable price is around $100 to $120 per barrel."

Iranian oil minister Rostam Ghasemi said Monday that Iran did not favor an oil price below $100/b.

Oil futures prices have since fallen below $100/b for benchmark Brent blend for the first time since last July, when stiffer sanctions against Iran came into effect and resulted in a sharp drop in its oil production and exports.

Iran is currently producing 2.7 million b/d, according to the latest Platts estimate of OPEC's production, which has fallen by some 1 million b/d over the 2011 average.

The EU has banned the import of Iranian crude oil while the US has imposed financial sanctions that forced Asian buyers of Iranian oil to slash their imports or risk being locked out of the US financial market.

--Aresu Eqbali, newsdesk@platts.com

--Edited by Kate Dourian, kate_dourian@platts.com; Haripriya Banerjee, haripriya_banerjee@platts.com

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