Joe Biden decided to use his last chance as US President to impose new, broad-based sanctions on Russian energy.
The Washington Post (WP) reported this, citing four sources.
According to the WP, such sanctions would give the team of the country's President-elect Donald Trump greater leverage in negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin to end Russia's war in Ukraine. The newspaper called such measures "Biden's parting blow to Putin's military treasury."
According to WP's interlocutors, new sanctions could be imposed against the so-called "shadow" fleet - international ships that supply Russian oil to countries outside the Western bloc, as well as against Russian exporters of this raw material, which have not been subject to sanctions so far. Among the options is the revocation of licenses that allow banks to facilitate Russian energy transactions.