The White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Thursday (local time) claimed that India had scaled back Russian oil imports at US President Donald Trump‘s “request” and China was doing the same.“If you read the sanctions and look at them, they’re pretty hefty. I saw some international news out of China this morning that they’re scaling back oil purchases from Russia. We know India has done the same at the request of the president,” Leavitt said at a White House press briefing.
“The president has also pushed European countries, our allies, to stop their purchases of Russian oil as well. So it’s a full-court press for sure. We expect that these sanctions are going to do harm, as the Secretary of Treasury said yesterday,” she added.This comes a day after Trump claimed that India would gradually cut down its Russian oil imports to “nothing” by the end of the year.“India, as you know, has told me they are going to stop…it’s a process. You can’t just stop (buying oil from Russia). By the end of the year, they’ll be down to almost nothing; almost 40 percent of the oil,” he said.India has dismissed reports of any policy shift, reiterating that its priority remains safeguarding consumer interests. The clarification comes after Trump imposed a 50% tariff on Indian goods in response to India’s continued purchase of Russian oil.
