India Increasing Imports of Russian Crude, Expert Says
India has substantially increased imports of Russian crude oil in the last few months and could start buying even more, said Reid l’Anson, a commodity economist with Kpler, during a July 22 webinar hosted by the Atlantic Council. India is on pace this month to buy 1 million Russian barrels per day, a significant surge from pre-invasion levels, l’Anson said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
Although the U.S has imposed a ban on Russian oil and some European countries are hoping to eventually do the same (see 2205310020), India is unlikely to follow suit, said Sarang Shidore, an expert at the Quincy Institute. Shidore said India doesn’t generally support unilateral sanctions, and while it is complying with other U.S. sanctions against Russia -- such as controls on exports of certain technology -- its energy purchases are likely to continue.
“There is certainly a very significant divergence, a very large divergence, between India and the United States on the whole question of the war and on imposing sanctions,” Shidore said. The Biden administration said the U.S. doesn’t plan to penalize other countries -- including India -- for continuing to buy Russian oil (see 2204110037).
l’Anson called India’s surge in Russian crude oil imports a “new development.” The countries have historically traded in coal, he said, but Russian crude now makes up about one-fifth of the 5 million barrels India imports daily through its sea ports.
As Russia faces more energy restrictions, India has “helped to fill the gap” left by customers that will no longer buy from Moscow, l’Anson said. “India has become a very important purchaser when it comes to Russia's reliance on new buyers,” he said.