Three tankers carrying Russian Urals crude are on their way to Reliance Industries’ Jamnagar refinery, Kpler has reported, as cited by Bloomberg, despite U.S. sanctions targeting the biggest oil companies in Russia.
The vessels are carrying some 2.2 million barrels, with the sellers several trading companies, including two that are under UK sanctions, one of which is the successor of Lukoil’s international trading arm, Litasco, Bloomberg noted in its report.
Lukoil and Rosneft, Russia’s biggest oil producers and exporters, were hit with U.S. sanctions last year, which prompted shifts in oil flows from Russia abroad, from the top companies to smaller, non-sanctioned players. The two together account for about half of Russia’s total oil exports, or some 2 million barrels daily.
Analysts predicted that, as a result of the sanctions, Indian buyers would start shunning Russian crude, but instead, early data for December 2025 suggested that Russian oil imports were on track to hit the highest in six months, reaching 1.85 million barrels daily, Kpler said in mid-December. That would be up from 1.83 million barrels daily in November and the highest since June, when Indian buyers imported Russian crude at a rate of 2.1 million barrels daily.
Prior to the U.S. sanctions, Rosneft was the top oil supplier to Reliance Industries for its Jamnagar refinery but after the sanctions, per Bloomberg reports, the Indian company began looking for diversification options. Rosneft has a long-term supply deal with Reliance for 500,000 barrels daily. Overall, Reliance was the biggest buyer of Russian crude in the world in both 2024 and 2025, Bloomberg reported.
The publication also said Russian oil flows to India shrank in December to the lowest in three years. Per LSEG data cited by Reuters in December, however, the flow of Russian oil to India in the same month was rather stable, at 1.2 million barrels daily, down from 1.77 million barrels daily in November—much lower than Kpler’s estimate but much higher than the 800,000 bpd in daily flows that Bloomberg had predicted for December.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
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