Brussels intends to include the oil embargo in its sixth package of sanctions on Moscow, in response to the offensive in Donbas
The European Commission announced on Tuesday that it is working to include the ban on imports of Russian oil as part of the sixth package of sanctions on Moscow and in response to the start of the offensive in Donbas. After the Russian coal embargo, the blockade of oil and gas is the main weapon of the EU, however, the European partners are divided on the energy blockade of Russia.
The Community Executive is developing “intelligent” mechanisms to apply sanctions to Russian crude, according to its spokesman. Brussels is working to establish punishments that have a massive impact on the Kremlin and that damage the economies of the Member States as little as possible, but Europe’s high energy dependence -which imports 40% of its energy- makes the task difficult.
Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the EU institutions have shown their firm determination to reduce their dependence on Russian energy. Therefore, it seems a matter of time, as the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, said, that the veto be extended to oil and gas.
Meanwhile, the war is intensifying and the French government urged on Tuesday to apply an embargo on crude oil imports from Russia. The French Finance Minister, Bruno Le Maire, defended in an interview with the French radio station ‘Europe 1’, that this measure is “more necessary than ever”. In fact, in 2021, Moscow supplied 30% of the crude oil and 15% of the oil derivatives imported by the EU, a bill that rises to 74,000 million euros per year.
Notice from Germany and Hungary
On the other side are the countries that are totally opposed to any sanctions on oil or gas. Hungary is in this bloc, which has already warned that it would block any decision that includes measures of this type. Also Germany, highly dependent on Russian energy, where businessmen and the industrial sector have warned that the cut in supply would cause a stoppage in production lines and the loss of jobs.
To alleviate these effects, the United States has promised to increase its exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to the EU by 68%, so that it covers a third of European demand. Thus, Washington will provide the continent with an additional 15,000 million liters of LNG in 2022.
In this way, Germany calculates that it will be able to achieve full independence from Russia in two years. A deadline, however, excessive for the high humanitarian cost of the war in Ukraine. For this reason, in parallel, the Community Executive has established contacts with other oil and gas suppliers such as Qatar, Egypt or Nigeria and with large LNG buyers such as Japan. The result of this equation should satisfy all member states, since sanctions against Russia require unanimity in the European Council.
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