This should help bring down the world oil price, Reiche said, noting that fellow members of the International Energy Agency (IEA) were also struggling with rising prices.

"The International Energy Agency therefore asked its member states yesterday evening to release oil reserves amounting to 400 million barrels," Reiche said, adding: "We will comply with this request and make our contribution."

Petrol stations in Germany would meanwhile be obliged to limit their price rises to one per day, Reiche said, adding that past crises had shown that costs at the pump tended to rise rapidly with the oil price, but fall more slowly.

"We have therefore decided to limit the frequency of price changes," Reiche said. "Petrol stations are only allowed to increase their fuel prices once a day. But price reductions are allowed at any time."