HOUSTON, April 12 (Xinhua) -- The American Petroleum Institute (API) on Tuesday reported an increase of 7.757 million barrels of crude oil in U.S. inventories for the week ending April 8.

       Analysts expected an increase of about 1.367 million barrels for this week.

       The API reported a surge of 1.08 million barrels in the previous week.

       Oil prices surged on Tuesday after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) warned of severe supply risks if Russian oil is fully banned.

       The West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for May delivery added 6.31 U.S. dollars, or 6.7 percent, to settle at 100.60 U.S. dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

       Brent crude for June delivery increased 6.16 dollars, or 6.3 percent, to close at 104.64 dollars a barrel on the London ICE Futures Exchange.

       OPEC Secretary-General Mohammad Barkindo warned on Monday at a meeting between European Union (EU) representatives and OPEC that it would not be able to offset an outage of up to 7 million barrels per day in the event of an embargo on Russian oil.

       The EU remains divided on a ban on Russian crude oil imports, but some foreign ministers said the option is not off the table.