Oil prices extended gains, after rising a dollar a barrel in the prior session, as investors braced for a worsening of the Middle East crisis, potentially involving Iran, the third-largest oil producer in OPEC, Reuters reports.

Brent crude futures advanced by 30 cents, or 0.3 per cent, to $90.78 a barrel by 0325 GMT, while US West Texas Intermediate crude futures rose 25 cents, or 0.3pc, to $86.46 a barrel.

Both contracts rose more than 1pc in the prior session after three sons of a Hamas leader were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza, feeding worries that ceasefire talks between the two sides might stall.

Earlier this week, Israel and Hamas began a fresh round of negotiations in their more than six-month-old Gaza conflict but those discussions have yielded no agreement.

Opinion

Merging for what?

Merging for what?

The concern is that if the government is thinking of cutting costs through the merger, we might even lose the functionality levels we currently have.

Editorial

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