In response to the war between Russia and Ukraine, the European Union imposed severe sanctions on imports of Russian crude. However, this action had little impact on Russia but a severely detrimental one on the EU.
The war has not been kind to the European Union. Almost every nation inside the Bloc suffers from a severe energy crisis, and France is no different.
As Russia continues to cut off supply to Europe while historic heatwaves are causing a spike in demand for gas to cool homes, everyone is pretty sure that a very cold and troubled winter lies ahead if the current situation is not taken into control.
Seeing all this, Emmanuel Macron met MBZ for a little help. And guess what, it seems like the help just touched down in Paris in the form of Russian laundered oil.
Macron strikes deal with MBZ
As per media reports, President of France Emmanuel Macron has secured a deal on new energy supplies from the United Arab Emirates after talks with UAE leader Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan in Paris.
Reportedly, France has struck a energy deal with UAE, especially for diesel consignments. The deal “for collaboration in the domain of energy supplies” was signed between French energy giant Total Energies and UAE national ADNOC.
This cooperation also aims to find cooperative investment projects in the hydrogen, renewable, and nuclear energy sectors in France, the UAE, or elsewhere, according to a statement from the French government.
To make a long story short, France has signed energy deal for oil supplies from UAE at this point in time as the energy crisis in the nation has deepened. But, is this actually going to be UAE’s own oil? That remains under the cloud. But it is very likely that the oil has ties to Russia.
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MBZ had lobbied for Putin
This has been noted many times how the Middle East has a puppy love for Russia. Most of the Middle East nations have extended their support for Russia in recent times and UAE is no different. UAE has not even once condemned Russian actions in the Ukraine war.
UAE had also abstained from a vote at the United Nations Security Council to condemn Russian aggression. Moreover, while the world has sanctioned Russian industry leaders, Russian oligarchs were warmly welcomed in the UAE.
France has knowingly signed the energy deal with UAE for diesel because it knows that the oil is from Russia as UAE had imported Russian oil in recent times.
The Russian oil imports in the Middle East were at their highest level since 2016. Over one-third of it went to Fujairah, a major center for oil trading and storage in UAE. As per Reuters, the Russian oil arrivals in the UAE oil hub of Fujairah jumped sharply to about 2.5 million barrels this month in the month of May.
There are several reports that confirm that UAE is helping Russia with oil exports. There were huge exports of diesel and other fuel products in the UAE during the last four months.
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So, UAE is serving as a hub for the transit of Russian crude. The French President is well aware that buying oil in broad daylight with Russia would draw attention from the entire globe and raise concerns about the stature of the European nation. Thus, the agreement with MBZ was reached on purpose.
