Dozens of oil tankers in Russia’s shadow fleet will be hit by a fresh round of Australian sanctions in a bid to starve Vladimir Putin of revenue to fund his war machine as the federal government announces its first military support package for Ukraine in more than a year.
The new measures, however, will not silence growing calls for the government to go further by pledging to join the European Union and United Kingdom by committing to ban the import of any Russian-origin oil through intermediary countries.
A leading sanctions law expert has blasted Australian efforts to target the trade of Russian-origin oil as “weak and slow”, arguing government policies need to be toughened to ensure Australians are not inadvertently helping funnel money to the Kremlin.