Trump Officials Defend Decision To Lift Some Sanctions On Russian Oil
HuffPost
The officials also claimed that the sharp increase in gasoline prices resulting from the Iran war would last only weeks.
WASHINGTON, March 8 (Reuters) - Trump administration officials on Sunday defended a decision to temporarily lift some sanctions on Russian oil and predicted that a sharp increase in gasoline prices resulting from the Iran war would last only weeks.
Appearing on multiple TV talk shows, Energy Secretary Chris Wright and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz said a waiver issued last week to allow Indian purchases of Russian oil would alleviate pressure on the global market.
“It’s a 30-day pause to allow, which is just kind of common sense, to allow the millions and millions of barrels of oil that are sitting out on ships to go to Indian refineries,” Waltz said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Wright told CNN’s “State of the Union” that the waiver can help “tamp this fear of shortage of oil, tamp the price spikes and the concerns we see in the marketplace.”
With the war now in its second week and no end in sight, Americans are grappling with higher prices at the pump, a new complicating factor for the U.S. economy, which unexpectedly lost 92,000 jobs in February.
The military campaign has killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, sunk at least 10 Iranian warships and struck more than 1,000 targets.
As the American and Israeli airstrikes continued, a top Iranian security official vowed defiantly that “we will not negotiate with the United States.”
Blasts in Tehran sent a huge plume of smoke into the sky in an area of government buildings.
Four people were injured at the airport, the emirate's media office said early on Sunday.