By Vladimir Soldatkin
MOSCOW (Reuters) -Igor Sechin, one of the most influential men in Russia’s energy sector, said on Tuesday that sanctions imposed by the United States, European powers and their allies on Russia and China will trigger an economic crisis in the West.
The West has slapped waves of sanctions on Russia since it annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 and introduced what it says are the toughest ever sanctions imposed on a major economy after Russia sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
China has accused the United States and its allies of undermining the rules-based multilateral trading system with repeated use of discriminatory policies, reciprocal tariffs, and unilateral sanctions that contravene WTO commitments.
Speaking at the Russian-Chinese Energy Business Forum (RCEBF) in Beijing, Sechin, who heads Rosneft, Russia’s biggest oil company, said the consumers in the West are already paying a high price for energy that would sap the West’s strength.
“The West’s continued aggressive policy of sanctions against both Russia and China will undoubtedly bring about another economic crisis in Western countries,” Sechin said. “Not all Western politicians realise the risks they face.”
Last month, the administration of Donald Trump declared sanctions against Rosneft and Russia’s second-largest oil producer Lukoil in an effort to force Russia to strike a peace deal with Ukraine.
Russia, the holder of world’s largest natural gas reserves and second-largest exporter of oil, has already effectively lost the European Union’s market, once its largest source of revenues from oil and gas sales.
President Vladimir Putin has said that Russia will not succumb to the pressure and will pursue its policies as it sees fit.
“Let me remind you that, like China, Russia has been under increasing external pressure for many years,” Sechin said. “The primary goal of this pressure is to push our country out of the global market. The experience of the last ten years has shown that these attempts are doomed to failure.”
Sechin said that Russia and China had a competitive advantage with lower prices for electricity than the West.
He said the cost of electricity in Russia and China was two times lower than in the United States and three to four times lower than in the European Union.
Sechin said that the high prices for power in the West could trigger a sharp increase in state spending and household spending in the West which be at risk of upheaval.
He quoted Sun Tzu: “Tactics without strategy is just vanity before defeat,” Sechin said.
(Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
