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Brent futures for February delivery fell 42 cents, or 0.5%, to
$83.91 a barrel, by 1215 GMT. U.S. crude fell 32 cents, or 0.4%,
to $79.21 per barrel.
Both benchmarks fell by over $1 per barrel earlier in the
session after rising to their highest in three weeks on Tuesday
on expectations of a rise in fuel demand.
China said it will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into
quarantine from Jan. 8, a major step towards relaxing stringent
curbs on its borders.
China's civil aviation authority said it would fully restore
pre-pandemic flight procedures by the summer-autumn of 2023.
Chinese hospitals have been under intense pressure due to a
surge in COVID-19 infections as the country moves towards
treating the virus as endemic.
"Even after China eased COVID restrictions, it is difficult for
demand to recover in a short time due to the rapid decline of
people's outdoor activities due to the massive infection
(numbers)," said Leon Li, an analyst at CMC Markets.
Oil refiners in the United States on Tuesday worked to resume
operations at a dozen facilities knocked offline by freezing
weather across much of the country, a recovery that in some
cases will stretch into January.
The Arctic blast cut oil and gas production from North Dakota
and Texas.
Prices were supported by news that Russia aims to ban oil sales
from Feb. 1 to countries that abide by a G7 price cap imposed on
Dec. 5. But details of how the ban would work were unclear and
hence gave only a modest support to prices.
U.S. crude oil stocks were estimated to have fallen 1.6 million
barrels last week with distillate inventories also seen down, a
preliminary Reuters poll showed on Tuesday.
Industry group the American Petroleum Institute is due to
release data at 4.30 p.m. EDT (2130 GMT) on Wednesday. The U.S.
government will release its figures at 10.30 a.m. (1530 GMT) on
Thursday.
(Reporting by Arathy Somasekhar and Isabel Kua; Editing by Simon
Cameron-Moore, Christian Schmollinger, Louise Heavens and
Barbara Lewis)
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