Japan's biggest oil refiner, Eneos Holdings Inc., has no plans to buy Russian crude until all problems related to the Ukraine crisis are over and will purchase alternative supplies from the Middle East, its chairman said on Wednesday.
"For now, we intend to get alternatives from existing trading partners such as Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Kuwait, but we will continue our efforts to diversify our sources to reduce reliance on the Middle East in the future," Tsutomu Sugimori, chairman of Eneos Holdings, told reporters.
Last month, Sugimori said that Eneos had stopped buying Russian crude in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which Moscow calls a "special operation."