A legitimate loophole allowed Russia to export $1.2 billion in oil to the EU
An EU sanctions loophole that allows the import of Russian crude if refined elsewhere earned Russia about $1.2 billion (1.1 billion euros) from fuel sales in the European Union last year, despite the embargo on direct imports from Russia, as an investigation by the NGO Global Witness showed on Friday .
For more than a year, the EU has imposed a ban on imports of crude oil and fuel from Russia – with a temporary exemption for Bulgaria – as the bloc and its US, British and other allies seek to limit the resulting revenue from oil sales that Vladimir Putin needs to fight his war in Ukraine.
However, Russian crude refined into fuels elsewhere, for example in India, can be imported into the EU and the Kremlin continues to receive revenue for its “recycled” fuels outside Russia. So the Russian way was simple: have the crude refined elsewhere, for example in India, but also in the Gulf, and then have the finished product exported to the EU, among other things saving its own refining capacity for the domestic market.
Global Witness has been monitoring maritime flows of crude oil from Russia to refineries around the world and then to European ports and revealed that in 2023 an estimated 35 million barrels of Russian oil will enter the EU in the form of refined petroleum products. It is impossible to trace specific molecules, but Global Witness has analyzed the relative volume of Russian versus non-Russian oil used in refinery feedstocks where data is available.
“The fuel enters through a not-so-small loophole left by EU sanctions, which allows products refined from Russian oil to enter the bloc. This has given rise to a “laundry” in which refiners in countries like India and Turkey can import discounted Russian crude, refine it into products like diesel, jet fuel or gasoline, and legally sell the refined oil to jurisdictions embargoed like the EU,” Global Witness said.
Through the same loophole, Russian fuel also reaches the UK and the US. In August 2023, a Global Witness analysis showed that one in 20 British flights were powered by jet fuel made from Russian oil, and in November Global Witness reported that the US had imported 30 million barrels of the fuel from refineries who import Russian oil.
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The article A legitimate loophole allowed Russia to export $1.2 billion in oil to the EU comes from Economic Scenarios .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/una-scappatoia-legittima-ha-permesso-alla-russia-di-esportare-12-miliardi-di-dollari-in-petrolio-nella-ue/ on Sun, 25 Feb 2024 06:15:46 +0000.