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The European Commission yesterday proposed a sweeping ban on any services that support Russia’s seaborne crude oil exports, going far beyond previous piecemeal EU sanctions in its effort to stunt Moscow’s key source of income for its war on Ukraine.
Russia exports over a third of its oil in Western tankers – mostly from Greece, Cyprus and Malta – with the help of Western shipping services.
The ban would end that practice, which mostly supplies India and China, and render obsolete a price cap on purchases of Russian crude oil that the Group of Seven Western powers have tried to enforce with mixed success.
Reuters was first to report in December that the European Union and the G7 were discussing the ban.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen did not specify how the ban would be phased in or whether it would later include refined products – whose price cap is different – and other energy exports such as liquefied natural gas (LNG).
She said the ban would be ‘in co-ordination with like-minded partners’, and that Russian LNG tankers and icebreakers would encounter ‘sweeping bans’ on maintenance and other services.
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