Russia issues new measures to cope with Western sanctions: economist
Delyagin said the US wants to divide the world for the interest of its own, and Russia just tries to pull the worsening situation back to normal
Russia has issued new measures to cope with sanctions imposed by Western countries and the energy bans will not pose great threats, said a famous Russian economist on Wednesday.
Mikhail Delyagin, also a member of the Russian State Duma, said an array of measures that promote innovation and support business have been passed by the Duma and signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"New measures aim to accelerate development and find substitutes for imports. First we should know clearly the main problems. We must figure out what products can be replaced by local ones; what products we need time to produce and what products we should purchase and how. As far as I know, we are already on it. We have communications with China on such issues," said Delyagin.
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US President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced the imposition of an energy embargo on Russia, banning US imports of oil, liquefied natural gas and coal from Russia over its ongoing military operations in Ukraine.
"I don't think this will become a major threat to Russia. Our oil and oil products supplying the US account for only 10 percent of our total export volume. Besides our current oil and relative products export volume is 2.7 times that of three years ago. This means the US is not our main market and that there is pressure on the US," said Delyagin.
"Energy is our weapon. We should announce limits on energy exports. We all know the conflict between Russia and West countries is not economic conflict, but conflict of principles. We should pay the price of loss, and make antagonists yield. This is our weapon, not theirs," said Delyagin.
The European Union unveiled a plan to reduce its dependency on Russian fossil fuels, but Delyagin thought it would not be a big issue.
"Europe cannot follow America's policies. We should do to Europe what the United States wants to do to us. We should stop our oil and natural gas supply to Europe, all oil products. Then we should have a talk with Europe and ask them why they provoke our relationship with Ukrainians," said Delyagin.
Delyagin said the US wants to divide the world for the interest of its own, and Russia just tries to pull the worsening situation back to normal.
"For 20 years I've been saying the world will be divided into several large areas. Unfortunately it is happening in this way. The US tries to divide the world based on its rules. Trump made the attempt at the cost of US own interests. The US didn't understand his intention. Biden tried to achieve the same goal starting from the position of the US Our task is pulling the situation onto the normal track," said Delyagin.
