Shortly before the end of US President Joe Biden’s term of office, the US and the UK have tightened their sanctions against Russia’s energy sector.
The sanctions affect two of Russia’s largest oil companies and the Sovcomflot fleet, among others, the US Treasury Department announced last Friday. With its sanctions, the USA wants to dry up a major source of income for Russia.
The sanctioned oil companies Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas reportedly produce more than one million barrels of oil per day. This corresponds to a value of around US$23bn (around €22.5bn) per year. In addition to the USA, the British government is also imposing sanctions against these two Russian companies.
Further measures are aimed at Russia’s so-called shadow fleet. The US Treasury Department lists 183 oil tankers, gas tankers and other freighters or the shipping companies behind them that Russia is using to circumvent existing sanctions on oil transportation.
As a result of these sanctions, US citizens and companies based in the USA are prohibited from doing business with the sanctioned companies and individuals. The weakening of the Russian energy industry is intended to deprive the Kremlin of the basis for financing the war in Ukraine.
In practice, experts estimate that this could lead to 25% of this technically critical fleet disappearing from the market.
