Indian oil refiners have started looking for alternative supplies of crude after President Trump threatened secondary sanctions on Russian energy exports if Moscow refuses to sign a ceasefire deal for the Ukraine.
Bloomberg reported that companies such as Bharat Petroleum Corp. and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. were looking for oil cargoes from the Middle East, the North Sea, and the Mediterranean for May delivery in anticipation of tariff action.
President Trump threatened a 25% tariff on all Russian oil, saying “If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault — which it might not be — but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia,” in an interview for NBC.
“That would be that if you buy oil from Russia, you can’t do business in the United States. There will be a 25% tariff on all oil, a 25- to 50-point tariff on all oil,” Trump elaborated.
The mechanism would be the same as the one Trump applied to Venezuela, slapping a 25% tariff on all imports from countries that continue buying crude from the South American nation.
Such a tariff would be a considerable problem for India, whose dependence on imported crude hit an all-time high in the latest fiscal year. India imported 88.2% of the crude it consumed in the April 2024-February 2025 period, according to oil ministry data released at the end of last month. This is up from 87.7% for the previous fiscal year.
Due to this dependence, India is particularly price-sensitive, which is why it stepped up its purchases of Russian oil following the barrage of Western sanctions directed at Russia’s energy industry. Russia is currently India’s biggest single oil supplier.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
