UK intelligence agency names reasons for Russian fuel shortages

Fuel is in short supply in Russia. Petrol prices in the Russian Federation have started to break records. For example, the price of AI-92 rose by 1.55% to 69.64 thousand rubles per tonne, which became a historical record. If we talk about AI-95, the cost of fuel eventually rose by another 0.47% and stopped at the mark of 76.27 thousand rubles per tonne. However, such a rise in price and shortage of petrol is not related to the war in Ukraine. This was reported in the Ministry of Defence of the UK in X (Twitter).

The greatest shortage of fuel is felt in the Crimea, Krasnodar region and other southern regions.

In the British intelligence believes that its deficit may be caused by a number of factors, in particular the increase in demand by the agricultural sector, annual maintenance of oil refineries and attractive export prices.

Russia is known to have stopped almost all petrol and diesel exports in order to stabilise the domestic market. British intelligence points out that this could affect countries that depend on Russian fuel supplies.

Meanwhile, Russia is considering two options to stabilise the market. The first is to completely ban the export of oil products for some time. The measure will allow to saturate the domestic market with fuel. In the second case, the government may raise export duties up to $250 per tonne.

It should be noted that in April this year exports of petroleum products from Russia totalled 3m b/d. Among the main buyers were Turkey, China and India, Middle Eastern and African countries, including Saudi Arabia, as well as Singapore and Malaysia.