Russia creates a 'Shadow Fleet' of more than 100 oil tankers to bypass We

Moscow: While imposing a price cap on Russian crude oil, the Western alliance, along with the European Union, has decided to stop seaborne imports of Russian crude oil. It came to light that Russia has created a ‘shadow fleet’ of more than 100 oil tankers to circumvent these sanctions imposed by the West. Leading UK daily ‘The Financial Times’ has published an article on it. Even as the report was released, Hungary, a member country of the European Union, announced an exemption from the ‘price cap’ rule.

After the start of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the West imposed massive sanctions to cripple the Russian economy and oil sector. Although it has affected Russia to an extent, efforts to disrupt the fuel sector and economy have not received much success. Many European countries, including the United States, and the UK, have stopped directly importing Russian fuel. Nevertheless, it has come to light that many of these countries are buying Russian fuel in different ways. Against this backdrop, on Friday, the G7 group, the European Union and Australia announced that they had approved the proposal to keep the price of crude oil exported from Russia at 60 dollars per barrel.

Russia has warned that the decision of ‘price cap’ is unacceptable and will give a befitting reply to it. At the same time, Russia, on the other hand, is busy trying to circumvent Western sanctions at various levels. The ‘Shadow Fleet’ plan is a part of this Russian agenda and is believed to have been created to maintain its oil exports without any hurdles. Russia has bought 103′ oil tankers’ from different parts of the world in the last year. It also includes tankers exporting fuel from Iran and Venezuela.

It is said that through this ‘Oil Tankers Fleet’, Russia will continue to supply essential crude oil to India, China, Turkey and other countries. Companies and analysts from the fuel industry have claimed that Russian oil of up to five hundred thousand barrels or more would be reduced from the international market after implementing Western sanctions. However, Russian officials have clarified that Russia will make every effort to supply crude oil to other countries as per existing agreements.

Meanwhile, Hungary, a member country of the European Union, said it had received relief from the ‘price cap’ announced on Friday. This information was given by Peter Szijjarto, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Hungary. The Foreign Minister of Hungary said that they fought for the fuel security of Hungary in the meeting and received success.

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