• Russian FM says time has come for talks with US on future economic ties • Kyiv escalates drone attacks, striking Russian refineries and depots

WASHINGTON: The Trump administration on Friday renewed a sanctions waiver allowing countries to buy Russian oil and petroleum products that are at sea for about a month, extending an earlier move aimed at softening energy prices that have surged during a US-Israeli war against Iran.

The licence, issued by the Treasury Department, came just two days after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that Washington would not renew it, drawing swift condemnation from lawmakers who accused the government of reversing course and going easy on Moscow as its war on Ukraine grinds on.

The latest move allows for the purchase of oil and petroleum products that have been loaded onto any vessel as of Friday, May 16. It prolongs an earlier easing of sanctions that expired on April 11 and excludes transactions involving Iran, Cuba and North Korea.

On Wednesday, however, Bessent had said the US would not make such an extension for Russian or Iranian oil.

Democrats blast decision

The decision was slammed by Senate Democrats Jeanne Shaheen, Chuck Schumer and Elizabeth Warren as “shameful” in a joint statement. “This decision is shameful and a 180-degree reversal from Secretary Bessent, just two days after he pledged not to extend sanctions relief for Russia,” the senators said. “Make no mistake, Putin has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of President Trump’s war against Iran, as Russia saw oil revenues nearly double in March.”

The waivers aim to ease global supply shocks from the US-Israeli war against Iran, which retaliated by effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for energy shipments.

Future economic ties

Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a summit in Turkiye’s Antalya that the time has come for a conversation with the US about how Washington sees future economic ties with Russia, but that differences remain between the two countries.

Lavrov also said that Nato is “not in the best state” but that Russia would not meddle in the alliance’s internal affairs. Russia has made renewed economic cooperation with the US a core part of its pitch for a diplomatic detente with the administration of President Donald Trump.

Strikes on energy infrastructure

While diplomatic overtures were being discussed, Ukraine intensified its attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure.

Ukrainian drones struck a handful of Russia’s oil facilities overnight, including two oil refineries in the Samara region, an oil depot in Crimea and a Baltic Sea port that exports petroleum products, officials said on Saturday.

On the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula, the Moscow-backed governor of Sevastopol said that 22 drones had been downed, with incidents of damage across the city, including a fire at a fuel tank. The commander of Ukraine’s drone forces, Robert Brovdi, said Kyiv had targeted an oil depot.

Ukraine’s SBU security service said it also struck two Russian landing ships and a warship based on the peninsula.

In a statement on the Telegram messaging app acknowledging the port attack in the Leningrad region, Brovdi said Ukrainian forces also attacked oil refineries in the cities of Novokuibyshevsk and Syzran.

Separately, authorities in the southern Krasnodar region said on Saturday that a fire at an oil depot in Tikhoretsk and an oil terminal at the Black Sea port of Tuapse, which had burned since Thursday, have been extinguished. Both fires were caused by Ukrainian drone strikes.

Published in Dawn, April 19th, 2026