Bulgaria stopped importing Russian oil earlier today because of Moscow's war against Ukraine. Fuel from Russian oil will no longer be produced in the EU country. The new regulation affects the predominantly Russian Lukoil Neftochim oil refinery west of the Bulgarian Black Sea port city of Burgas.
Russian oil will be replaced by supplies from Kazakhstan, Iraq and Tunisia. This was reported by the Bulgarian newspaper “24 Chasa”.
Bulgaria's import ban followed a change to the law at the end of 2023. This meant that Sofia renounced a special EU license under which the country would have actually been allowed to import Russian oil until October 1 this year. In this way, Bulgaria wants to deprive Lukoil, and therefore also the Kremlin, of profits to finance the war.
Bulgaria has also stopped receiving Russian gas since 2022. The Russian company Gazprom stopped deliveries because the Sofia government refused to pay in rubles. Until before the war in Ukraine, Bulgaria was almost completely dependent on Russian natural gas.