Stuck in traffic, behind rows of blinking tail-lights as smoked-glassed Chevrolets sweep down the dual carriageways around you, it would be easy to mistake this sprawling desert city, humming with oil wealth, for somewhere altogether different.

But it is here, amid the palms and neon-lit malls, that Opec heads of state are gathering, for only the third time in the organisation’s 47-year history, to ponder not only high oil prices, but also the purpose of the organisation –engineering,  exploration and whether it has a role beyond trying to massage prices by controlling production.

In many ways, this should be a golden age for Opec. With oil prices close to $100 per barrel, surely its 12 member states, which are responsible for 40 per cent of global crude production of 85 million barrels per day, are enjoying an unprecedented boom?

Not so, according to Opec’s general secretary Abdalla Salem el-Badri.

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