Bulgaria ends Russian oil imports

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS - In Brief 02 Mar 2024 by Alex Teddy
On March 1 Bulgaria made the announcement that it has finally brought itself fully into line with EU sanctions on Russia. The sanctions on Russian oil adopted in 2022 granted exemptions to Hungary and Bulgaria because they were heavily reliant on Russian oil. Bulgaria's exemption was due to be phased out at the end of 2024. The Bulgarian Parliament in March 2023 voted to end the importation of oil from Russia in March 2024, and this has now been achieved. Bulgaria has been weaning itself off Russian oil since the start of the Ukraine War.  The end of oil exports to Bulgaria is a blow to Russia. The financial impact will be minimal because Bulgaria has only 7 million people and it was a very minor export market for Russia. However, psychologically it must hurt because Bulgaria is an Orthodox Christian and Slavic country. Moscow had assumed that Bulgaria would be relatively sympathetic. Thousands of Russian tourists visited Bulgaria in 2023. There is still a section of public opinion in Bulgaria that leans towards Russia. Bulgaria will buy oil from Tunisia, Iraq and Kazakhstan instead of Russia. Bulgaria is also a NATO country. It had a lot of Soviet era military assets left over from when it was a Soviet ally but gifted most of this to Ukraine.

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