China, EU still lead Russian fuel buys

As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its fifth year, the biggest buyers of Russian fossil fuels are still being dealt an easy hand, while India, which has contributed much less than China and the European Union (EU) to nearly a trillion dollar in Russian export revenues from fuels, has faced the stick, according to data from international forecasters and industry sources.

- S DINAKAR

India’s purchases of fossil fuels from Russia was just around half of what China paid and three fourths of what the EU contributed in the near four-year span of the conflict, industry data showed. But US President Donald Trump slapped a 50 per cent tariff on Indian exports earlier this year, half of which was in retaliation to India buying Russian oil. And the US has refused to drop it in spite of Indian refiners slashing purchases in December. China pays lower import duties than India on exports to the US and the EU pays a fraction, according to US government data.

The EU, which has introduced several sanctions and price caps on trade of Russian oil on Indian buyers, has contributed to 22 per cent of Russia’s revenues from fossil fuel exports, second only to China, in the 46 months to December 25, 2025, according to calculations based on data from Finnish think tank Centre for Research on Energy & Clean Air (CREA).

“According to our estimates, since the beginning of the war, Russia earned 996 billion euros ($1.2 trillion) in revenue from fossil fuel exports,” CREA said in its latest data set. “European Union countries purchased more than 218 billion euros of these exports.”