Sarkozy says EU Commission to study oil price measures

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Commission offered on Thursday to study a range of possible measures to tackle record high oil prices and report back to European Union leaders in October, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said.

He told a news conference after the first day of an EU summit that the world was facing an oil shock unprecedented compared to past energy crises.

The EU executive agreed to examine proposals that include suggestions from France for capping value-added tax, Italy on a "Robin Hood tax" on oil companies' profits and Austria for an EU tax on commodity speculation.

(reporting by Francois Murphy, writing by Paul Taylor)