Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy to Russia and Ukraine, has freshly warned in newly published comments that oil sanctions will have a serious and hard-hitting economic impact if properly enforced – though they haven’t been up till now, he suggested.
His prediction comes after President Trump’s announcement early this week that he would shorten Russia’s deadline to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine down to ten days from the previous 50. “We haven’t really applied full pressure on the oil sector yet,” Kellogg said on The Record With Greta Van Susteren.
“Russia’s a petrostate, exporting around 7 million barrels of oil daily, much of it through what’s called the ‘dark fleet,’” he continued.
Noting that India and China remain Russia’s two biggest oil customers, he described that the revenue from these exports helps finance the war in Ukraine and fund “huge bonuses” for soldiers being recruited as Russia expends manpower in a war of attrition.
The proposed sanctions, including 100% tariff on countries purchasing Russian oil, will “start to bite”…
“If that happens—and if Russian oligarchs start seeing the effects, especially with Russian sovereign assets largely held in Belgium—Putin will start feeling the pressure not just from within his military, but also from the oligarchs and internally,” Kellogg said.
He gaged the current level of sanctions as moderate, rating them at about “six out of ten” while admitting that enforcement remains weak, which he put at a “three out of ten.”
Kellog called for strengthening enforcement if Washington hopes to make the sanctions more effective.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin has shrugged off these new threats and Trump’s revised timeline, which is clearly aimed at drastically ratcheting the pressure on Moscow.
“We’ve taken note of President Trump’s statement,” Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Tuesday. “The special military operation continues.”
He added, “We remain committed to a peace process to resolve the conflict around Ukraine while safeguarding our national interests.”
As for what’s next after US new secondary sanctions are activated – probably little will change, at least initially. Russia has been able to weather the sanctions storm fairly well, while deepening its economic relations with major BRICS countries, and its ground advance in Ukraine east – and even into Sumy lately – has shown no signs of stopping. At home, store shelves are full, and average Russian citizens have been living their daily lives with little perceptible change in circumstances.
Credit Oilprice.com
