NEW DELHI, December 9. /TASS/. G7 countries have put on a cheap show on the G20 platform in connection with the imposition of a cap on Russian oil prices with an aim to persuade developing countries to join this initiative, Russian presidential representative (sherpa) in the G20, Svetlana Lukash, told TASS on Friday.
"There was some kind of stage show. All partners in the G7 group literally promoted the newly introduced decision to set a price cap on Russian oil word for word," Lukash said following the G20 sherpas’ meeting in Udaipur, India.
She said that these countries’ representatives "were actively calling on participants from the developing world, seated around the table, to join [the cap on Russian oil prices], presenting this measure as the only way to reduce prices and to help them."
"This, of course, is pure market manipulation and a distortion of the basic principles of a market economy. It was outright interference in the foundations of the very system that they themselves are trying to safeguard," Lukash said.
However, there was no reaction from the rest of the G20 members to the G7 countries’ statements concerning the introduction of a cap on Russian oil prices.
"No one has reacted in any way. G7 members were reading out their cliched arguments, while the other countries merely listened to them," Lukash noted.
She did not rule out that the discussion of caps on the price of Russian fuel would continue among the G20 energy ministries.
"We'll see, but so far there has been nothing apart from advertising," she said. From December 4 to 8, India’s city of Udaipur (the state of Rajasthan) hosted the first meeting of G20 sherpas since the beginning of New Delhi's presidency of the group. An initiative agreed to by G7 countries, the EU and Australia for a cap on the price of Russian oil supplied by sea took effect on November 5.