Due to sanctions against Russia, the European Union lost €250 billion – Kommersant

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov believes that the US authorities, forcing the European Union to abandon “everything Russian,” continue to buy uranium and critical materials from Russia. According to the minister, the EU lost at least €250 billion due to sanctions.

“Washington, in essence, is ruining its European vassals and allowing its military-industrial complex to earn money. He imposed and continues to impose expensive American liquefied natural gas on the EU, and with his selfish laws forces European companies to transfer enterprises overseas to places where basic costs are lower,” the minister said at the embassy round table on resolving the military conflict with Ukraine.

The head of the Russian Foreign Ministry also said that “according to the most conservative estimates,” European business lost up to €250 billion due to sanctions. “This is a big figure,” the minister noted.

At the same time, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Grushko said that the total losses of the European Union from sanctions against Russia and the curtailment of economic cooperation, according to “the most conservative estimates,” amount to about $1.5 trillion.

“Forcing the EU to abandon everything Russian, Washington continues to buy uranium and other critical materials from Russia,” believes Sergei Lavrov.

In 2021, the European Union and the United States bought approximately 30 thousand tons of uranium, or 78 million pounds of U3O8 (uranium oxide-oxide), from Russia. In 2022, Russia exported almost 5 thousand tons of uranium to these countries, or 70% of its total production, including in Kazakhstan. In the first half of the year, the United States bought 416 tons of uranium from Russia—twice as much as in the same period in 2022 and the maximum since 2005.

Read more about what is happening after the entry of Russian troops into Ukraine in the Kommersant online broadcast.