The U.S. extended on Wednesday a waiver allowing oil sales from Russia’s Sakhalin-2 project through June 18 next year, a move that likely allows production of liquefied natural gas from the project to continue.

The general license, issued by the U.S. Treasury Department, is important for U.S. ally Japan, which gets about 9% of its LNG from Russia. The license allowing transactions with Sakhalin-2 is a waiver to sanctions that had been imposed on the project by former President Joe Biden in 2022 over Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The move came despite pressure in trade negotiations by the administration of President Donald Trump on China, India and Japan to reduce their purchases of Russian oil and LNG.

The department also extended a waiver, also through June 18, allowing transactions involving Russian banks including Gazprombank related to civil nuclear power.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Timothy Gardner, Editing by Franklin Paul and Nia Williams)