MOSCOW: Moscow on Saturday accused the US of being ready to risk global energy instability with new wide-reaching sanctions on Russia’s energy sector.
The US and the UK on Friday announced new sanctions against Russia’s energy sector, including oil giant Gazprom Neft, just days before President Joe Biden leaves office.
Moscow’s foreign ministry said in a statement that on the eve of Biden’s “inglorious time in power,” Washington was trying to “cause at least some harm to Russia’s economy even at the cost of destabilising world markets.”
“Of course Washington’s hostile actions will not be left without reaction,” it added.
In a reference to the California wildfires, Moscow accused Biden’s administration of leaving behind “scorched earth,” or total destruction, for incoming US President Donald Trump — since he cannot cancel the sanctions without Congress approval.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov earlier told reporters that the Biden administration was trying to leave Trump “as heavy a legacy as possible.”
The US Treasury Department said Friday it was designating more than 180 ships as well as Russian oil majors Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas, fulfilling “the G7 commitment to reduce Russian revenues from energy.”
Gazprom Neft on Friday slammed the sanctions as “baseless” and “illegitimate,” Russian state news agencies reported.
Biden’s deputy national security adviser for international economics, Daleep Singh, called the sanctions “the most significant” yet on Russia’s energy sector, which he said was “by far the largest source of revenue for (President Vladimir) Putin’s war.”
The Russian ministry on Saturday accused the US of seeking to “hinder as far as possible or even make impossible any bilateral economic ties, including with US business.”
It said Washington was “sacrificing to this the interests... of European allies,” which are “forced to switch over to more expensive and unreliable American supplies.”
It also accused Washington of “ignoring” the views of its own population on rising energy prices once the presidential election was over.
Russia says US risks global energy instability with new sanctions
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Russia says US risks global energy instability with new sanctions
- “Of course Washington’s hostile actions will not be left without reaction,” said Moscow’s foreign ministry
- Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov earlier told reporters that the Biden administration was trying to leave Trump “as heavy a legacy as possible“
Bolivia and Israel to restore ties severed over the war in Gaza
- Paz's government eased visa restrictions on American and Israeli travelers last month
- The Bolivian foreign ministry said its top diplomat would meet his Israeli counterpart in Washington later Tuesday to discuss the revival of bilateral ties
LA PAZ, Bolivia: Bolivia's new right-wing government said Tuesday that it would restore diplomatic relations with Israel, the latest sign of the dramatic geopolitical realignment underway in the South American country that was once among the most vocal critics of Israeli policies toward Palestinians.
The Bolivian foreign ministry said its top diplomat would meet his Israeli counterpart in Washington later Tuesday to discuss the revival of bilateral ties, which Bolivia's previous left-wing government severed two years ago over Israel's devastating campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
Bolivia said the effort came as part of a new foreign policy strategy under conservative President Rodrigo Paz aimed at “rebuilding Bolivia's international prestige, opening new economic opportunities and strengthening alliances that directly benefit the country and our citizens abroad."
Bolivian Foreign Minister Fernando Aramayo is in the midst of a whirlwind trip to Washington for meetings with American officials as his government works to warm long-chilly relations with the United States and unravel nearly two decades of hard-line, anti-Western policies under the Movement Toward Socialism, or MAS, party that left Bolivia economically isolated and diplomatically allied with China, Russia and Venezuela.
Paz's government eased visa restrictions on American and Israeli travelers last month.
In announcing his expected meeting with Aramayo on Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar thanked Bolivia for scrapping Israeli visa controls and said he spoke to Paz after the center-right senator's Oct. 19 election victory to express “Israel’s desire to open a new chapter” in relations with Bolivia.
Paz entered office last month, ending the dominance of the MAS party founded by Evo Morales, the charismatic former coca-growing union leader who became Bolivia's first Indigenous president in 2006. Not long after taking power, Morales sent Israel's ambassador packing and cozied up to Iran over their shared enmity toward the U.S. and Israel.
When protests over Morales' disputed 2019 reelection prompted him to resign under pressure from the military, a right-wing interim government took over and restored full diplomatic relations with the U.S. and Israel as it sought to undo many of Morales’ popular policies.
But 2020 elections brought the MAS party back to power with the presidency of Luis Arce, who in 2023 once again cut ties with Israel in protest over its military actions in Gaza.
Other left-wing Latin American countries, like Chile and Colombia, soon made similar moves, recalling their ambassadors and joining South Africa’s genocide case against Israel before the United Nations’ highest judicial body.
