Biden’s warning to Putin

In a speech on March 11 at the White House, the President of the United States, Joe Biden, made several announcements regarding the crisis in Eastern Europe due to the war between Russia and Ukraine.

First of all, Biden noted that the Kremlin (the Russian government) “will pay a heavy price if chemical weapons are used” in Ukraine; and that is The United States and other Western countries are concerned about the possible use of chemical weapons by Moscow in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine that began on February 24.

For its part, Russia accuses Washington and Kiev of running laboratories aimed at producing biological weapons in the country, which the two capitals denied, and a meeting of the UN Security Council on this issue was scheduled for Friday.

And of a possible nuclear war, Biden said, at least for his part, There is a serious commitment to “avoid” a “direct confrontation between NATO and Russia”, as it would provoke a “third world war”.

“We will not wage war against Russia in Ukraine,” the US president insisted from the White House.

Another issue Biden spoke about related to the fact that the United States and its allies decided to exclude Russia from the normal reciprocity that governs global trade, opening the door to imposing punitive tariffs on Moscow in response to the invasion. Ukraine.

“We are taking additional steps to ban (trade with) key sectors of the Russian economy, in particular seafood, vodka and diamonds”Biden said.

It must be remembered that Moscow has, until now, benefited from the trade status of the “most favored nation”, which allows the free exchange of certain goods and services.

Oil from Colombia to the United States?

Since the start of the war in Ukraine, the United States has launched an attack on Russia with embargo and economic sanctions that include, among other products, oil that the North American giant imported from its Eurasian rival.

According to the American Fuel and Petrochemical Producers Association, Russia accounts for 3% of the crude oil imports used by the North American country each year.

For this reason, it appears that to balance and replace oil that will not come from Russia, Biden would have chosen to speak with Nicolas Maduro so that this country (with whom he has not had relations since 2019) would have sent the lost crude.

As expected, many figures from international politics, such as the President of Colombia, Ivan Duque, rejected these measures because they could be taken as a means of endorsing Maduro’s personality in Venezuela, and thus the Chavista regime in that country.

Thinking about this, in his March 10 meeting with Joe Biden, Duque insisted on the need to change his strategy, even offering Let Colombia be the country that sends to the United States the crude oil needed to fill the shortage that Russia might leave behind.

“Colombia today is a country with a greater capacity to supply hydrocarbons than Venezuela.”Duque said minutes later at a news conference at the Colombian embassy in Washington.

According to the president, Colombia currently produces more than 890,000 barrels of oil per day, and there are expectations to reach one million barrels in the near future.

*With information from Agence France-Presse.

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