- US allows India to buy Russian oil already loaded on ships.
- The approval is a temporary 30-day waiver from the Treasury Department.
- The move aims to ease global oil supply pressure during the conflict with Iran.
- The waiver applies only to oil already stranded at sea before March 5, 2026.
- US expects India to increase purchases of American oil in the future.
The United States has granted India temporary approval to purchase Russian oil that is already loaded on ships and floating at sea. The move is meant to ease pressure on global oil supplies during the ongoing conflict in West Asia.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced the decision in an interview with Fox Business on Friday. According to him, the Treasury Department agreed to allow India to accept Russian oil that was already on ships moving through waterways.
“The world is very well supplied in oil. Yesterday, the Treasury (Department) agreed to let our allies in India start buying Russian oil that was already on the water,” Bessent said.
He added that India had previously cooperated with US requests to stop buying sanctioned Russian oil. “The Indians had been very good actors. We had asked them to stop buying sanctioned Russian oil this fall. They did. They were going to substitute it with US oil. But to ease the temporary gap of oil around the world, we have given them permission to accept the Russian oil. We may unsanction other Russian oil,” he said.
Bessent also explained that a large amount of sanctioned Russian oil is currently stuck on ships. “There are hundreds of millions of sanctioned barrels of sanctioned crude on the water, and in essence, by unsanctioning them, Treasury can create supply. And we are looking at that. We are going to keep a cadence of announcing measures to bring relief to the market during this conflict.”
Other officials in the Trump administration also confirmed the move. Energy Secretary Chris Wright wrote on X that the US is allowing India to accept Russian oil already near Southern Asia to ensure that global oil supplies continue to flow.
“We have implemented short term measures to help keep oil prices down. We are allowing our friends in India to take oil that is already on ships, refine it, and move those barrels into the market quickly. A practical way to get supply flowing and ease pressure,” Wright said.
In an interview with ABC News Live, Wright said global oil supplies remain strong in the long term, but short-term challenges require quick solutions. “But as oil gets bid up a little bit because of those constraints coming out of the Strait of Hormuz, we're taking a short-term action to say all this floating Russian oil storage that's around Southern Asia, it's China just backed up, China does not treat their suppliers well, so there's a bunch of floating barrels just sitting there.”
He added that the US encouraged India to refine the oil quickly and release it into the global market. “We've reached out to our friends in India and said, ‘Buy that oil. Bring it into your refineries'. That pulls stored oil immediately into Indian refineries and releases the pressure on other refineries around the world to buy oil that they're no longer competing with the Indians for in that marketplace,” Wright said.
The Treasury Department earlier confirmed that the waiver would last 30 days. It allows Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil that had already been loaded on ships before March 5, 2026.
Officials stressed that the step is temporary and does not represent a change in US policy toward Russia. They also noted that the measure would not significantly benefit the Russian government because it only applies to oil already stranded at sea.
The waiver will remain valid until April 4, 2026, and only applies to deliveries made to ports in India by Indian entities.
