Sharjah24 - Reuters: Oil prices fell on Friday in thin market liquidity, closing a week marked by worries about Chinese demand and haggling over a Western price cap on Russian oil.

Brent crude futures dropped $1.17, or 1.4%, to trade at $84.17 a barrel by 12:43 p.m. EST (1625 GMT), having retraced some earlier gains.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down $1.05, or 1.4%, at $76.89 a barrel. There was no WTI settlement on Thursday due to the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday and trading volumes remained low.

"Because there's light volume after the holiday, we're giving up some of the gains here a bit," said Phil Flynn, an analyst at Price Futures group.

Both contracts were headed for their third consecutive weekly declines after hitting 10-month lows this week. Brent was set to end the week down 3.8%, while WTI was on track to fall 3.9%.

Brent and WTI's market structure implies current demand is softening, with backwardation, defined by front-month prices trading above contracts for later delivery, having weakened markedly in recent sessions.