MOSCOW, December 5. /TASS/. Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev took to his Telegram channel to excoriate the West’s price cap on Russian oil.
"It is merely astonishing how mankind likes to step on the same rake again and again, in an attempt to control prices for the sake of politics," the ex-president said. Such attempts have always ended with a commodity vanishing or its price soaring because the law of value remains in effect, he noted.
"This is what will happen with crude oil. Certainly, it will not disappear, but someone is dying to try and jump into the cold water to boast of his decisiveness later during elections," Medvedev maintained. "One thing is clear here - there will be nothing good for consumers, and that’s for sure," he says. "So let them stock up on schnapps, quilt blankets, and boilers," he suggested, warning "the worst is ahead, winter has just begun."
Medvedev compared these actions to the desire of an intoxicated crowd to climb into icy water to cool down. "Some of them will quickly sober up and jump out. The others will learn how to swim in the frigid water but badly (it is hard to be trained in an ice hole). And the others will drown," he adds.
On December 5, the EU’s embargo on Russian oil shipments by sea and its $60 a barrel cap on seaborne Russian crude became applicable. The G7 and Australia joined the EU price cap. A number of European experts worry that the measure will negatively affect the global economy. Russia warned earlier that it would not sell its crude under the conditions envisaged by the price cap, even if forced to cut production.