EU confirms more details of Russian oil embargo

EU officials have confirmed that the bloc's Russian oil embargo will involve phasing out seaborne crude imports within six months and refined product imports by the end of the year, in line with the timeline proposed in early May.

As announced overnight, EU leaders have agreed to exclude pipeline crude supplies from the embargo for an unspecified period, following pressure from some of the bloc's landlocked countries. The Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia have all been granted extra time to phase out their Russian oil imports. The precise timeline for Hungary and Slovakia will be decided at a later date, but in the case of the Czech Republic, it is 18 months.

"During this exemption, it will be possible to import products made from Russian oil," Czech prime minister Petr Fiala said.

Meanwhile, Slovakia's prime minister Eduard Heger said his country's demands had been accepted and that Slovakia will be able to import Russian oil until there is a "fully fledged alternative".

For the rest of the bloc, "it's a wind-down period ...until the end of the year. It's not abrupt", European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said. "By just working hard on not renewing contracts... and looking at other suppliers, you can fill this wind-down period much better," she said.

Italian prime minister Mario Draghi downplayed the impact of exempting some landlocked countries, while Belgian prime minister Alexander De Croo reiterated that these exemptions are temporary. "Hungary and the other countries get the time to adapt their infrastructure and invest in refinery capacity. But it is absolutely not indefinite. That's not in the texts," De Croo said.

Germany and Poland, which both take significant amounts of Russian pipeline crude, have pledged to implement the EU's ban regardless of the exemption for pipeline imports. The detailed legal texts of the oil embargo will be "sent and adopted tomorrow evening or the day after", said European Council president Charles Michel.

Von der Leyen presented the oil embargo plan on 4 May as a total ban on "all Russian oil, seaborne and pipeline, crude and refined". But the bloc was forced into a compromise following objections from a handful of member states, notably Hungary.

By Dafydd ab Iago