The government this afternoon denied that it is profiting from the increase in the price of fuels, announced yesterday.

In a statement, the Finance Ministry noted that according to the GWU, the government was the only one to benefit from the price rises since fuel, it said, is taxed at 55%.

The ministry insisted, however, that the price rises were solely a reaction to international price fluctuations.

It said there was no additional tax (duty) on the prices announced yesterday. "Duty on fuel is a fixed amount, not a percentage, and therefore the increase announced yesterday was solely due to the increase in the international oil price," the ministry said.

It said oil prices went up by more than 12% over the past weeks, primarily as a result of rising tensions between the West and Iran.

All European countries had raised their prices, the average being an increase of 6.6% between January and March, according to EU statistics. The lowest increases were in Malta, at 2.8%, the ministry said.

It added that the price of petrol in Malta is still the seventh cheapest in the EU and diesel is the fifth cheapest.

The ministry said the rising oil price was also impacting power costs, but the government was absorbing those costs without raising electricity bills, in contrast to what was happening in many other countries.

This was only possible because over the past years the government acted wisely to ensure that Malta's financial situation was sound.