Scott Bessent met with Russia’s finance minister. Then he said Ukrainian strikes on Russian energy sites were helping fuel a global ‘energy shock.’
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News that Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil infrastructure were contributing to a global energy shock, remarks he made after meeting Russia’s finance minister Anton Siluanov at a G20 gathering in North Carolina — Siluanov’s first invite to such a summit since the war began. Bessent also cited the U.S.-Iran conflict as a factor.
Former Ukrainian interior ministry adviser Anton Gerashchenko called the framing a reversal of cause and effect, arguing it recasts Ukraine as the source of a problem Russia’s invasion created, and noted midterm-election anxiety over gas prices as the likelier motive. A Senate-passed sanctions bill imposing tariffs on buyers of Russian oil has stalled in the House over fears it could raise fuel prices further.
Ukraine’s sanctions commissioner traveled to Washington this week voicing optimism about the bill’s prospects, while the EU weighs new travel and shipping restrictions on Russia after a drone incident at a German airport. Meanwhile, Russian strikes have kept industrial sites burning for a second day in Ukraine’s Kyiv region.
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