US says no objection to Pakistan importing Russian oil

Mr Price said US has no objection if Pakistan wants to import oil Russia.

WASHINGTON (Dunya News) - The United States of America has said that it has no objection to Pakistan importing Russian oil.

During a regular press briefing, State Department Spokesperson Ned Price was asked to share his views about Russia as it was near to a deal to sell oil to Pakistan, which of course traditionally hasn’t been a major importer of Russian oil.

Mr Price said US has no objection if Pakistan wants to import oil Russia. Our approach to this is – has been laid out in the price cap mechanism that we worked out with other countries around the world, including the G7, he added.

“And the virtue of the price cap is that it allows energy markets to continue to be resourced while depriving Moscow of the revenue it would need to continue to propagate and fuel its brutal war against Ukraine.”

He said the US has made the point that it has very intentionally not sanctioned Russian oil. Instead, it’s now subject to the price cap. “So we have encouraged countries to take advantage of that, even those countries that have not formally signed on to the price cap, so that they can acquire oil in some cases at a steep discount from what they would otherwise acquire from, in this case, Russia”, he added.

However, he said US has been very clear that now is not the time to increase economic activity with Russia but it understands the imperative of keeping global energy markets well resourced, well supplied, and the price cap, we believe, provides a mechanism to do that.