[Salon] The truth is that India increased its imports of Russian oil by a staggering 1, 800%

[Chas Freeman <cwfresidence@gmail.com>]

https://x.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1812722447390855207

The truth is that India increased its imports of Russian oil by a staggering 1,800% since before the war in Ukraine, whilst China increased its import of Russian oil by... 43% (and that's pretty much entirely for its domestic consumption, unlike India which resells a large percentage of the additional oil it buys from Russia). Src: https://iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/average-russian-oil-exports-by-country-and-region-2021-2023… In effect India compensated for almost 70% of Russia's revenue loss from the EU (!), whilst China compensated for 25%. But only one of those countries is labeled as a "decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine" by NATO, and it ain't India... In fact NATO calls India a "partner for a peaceful, free, and democratic world" (https://orfonline.org/expert-speak/nato-and-india-partners-for-a-peaceful-free-and-democratic-world…). I'm not blaming India, they're a sovereign country with the right to trade with whoever they wish, but it goes to illustrate the mind-numbing hypocrisy in NATO's discourse. The truth is that Global South countries overall do not follow Western sanctions on Russia and it's extremely disingenuous to single out a specific country. Instead the right question to ask should be why the West is so isolated on the international scene. And a big part of the answer is exactly this: for their double standards and hypocrisy.