The United States has imposed sanctions on the Russia-controlled Petroleum Industry of Serbia (NIS), prompting warnings from Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić of “unforeseeable” consequences for the Balkan nation ahead of winter, the Associated Press reported.
NIS said Thursday that it had failed to obtain another postponement of American measures and that the U.S. Treasury Department’s special license allowing it to operate “unhindered” has not been extended.
The company, which is Serbia’s main supplier of oil and is majority-owned by Russia’s Gazprom Neft, said it has sufficient reserves to continue serving customers “for a longer while,” but cautioned that foreign bank card payments at its fuel stations could be disrupted, the AP said.
Serbia relies almost entirely on Russian gas and oil, delivered mainly via pipelines through Croatia and neighboring states and refined at the country’s only oil refinery, also owned by Gazprom Neft. The newly imposed sanctions raise the risk of shortages of gasoline and heating oil.
Vučić, facing domestic pressure after months of anti-government protests, said the sanctions would have “extremely dire consequences” affecting “every citizen,” while urging the public not to panic, according to the report. “Trust your state. We will go through this together,” he said.
The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Russia’s oil sector on Jan. 10 and gave Gazprom Neft a deadline to exit NIS ownership, which it did not meet, according to the report.
Although a formal candidate for European Union membership, Serbia has declined to join Western sanctions on Russia over the invasion of Ukraine, citing its dependence on Russian energy supplies, the news agency said.
Vučić’s government, widely seen as pro-Russian, is also grappling with one of its most serious domestic challenges in years amid protests sparked by a fatal railway-station canopy collapse that many blame on corruption and shoddy construction tied to state projects with Chinese companies.
Read more at the Associated Press