Russian President Vladimir Putin. © Sputnik / Aleksandr Kazakov

Russia could place restrictions on the supply of certain strategically important raw materials to the global market, President Vladimir Putin stated on Wednesday. He said exports of nuclear fuel, metals, and minerals could all be affected.

The move would be a response to Western attempts to block Russia’s access to certain foreign-made goods, Putin said. While Ukraine-related sanctions limit Russia’s access to foreign markets and its ability to pay for goods made abroad, Western warnings of further secondary sanctions suggest that Russia’s access to dual-use goods, which have both civilian and military applications, could also be blocked.

At a government meeting on Wednesday, Putin said that despite Western restrictions, Russia continues to supply some types of goods to the world market “in large quantities” and in some cases buyers are happily stockpiling Russian products.

“Russia is a leader in terms of reserves of a number of strategic types of raw materials... Yet we are limited in the supply of a number of goods – maybe we should also think about certain restrictions,” the president said. He suggested that the proposed restrictions could include the country’s exports of uranium, titanium, and nickel, as well as “certain other goods.” 

“There is no need to do anything to harm ourselves… I am not saying that we need to do this tomorrow. But, in general, if this will not harm us, we could think about certain restrictions on supplies to foreign markets,” Putin suggested, noting that the significance of the potential move would be difficult to underestimate given the “importance of Russian raw materials.”

Russia’s share of the enriched uranium market is estimated to be around 40%. The fuel is critical for both civil nuclear power generation and military nuclear weapons. The country is also the world’s largest producer of titanium, which is important to the aerospace industry. According to the UK-based Mining Technology portal, Russia is among the ten largest producers of nickel, a key component in clean energy generation.

While the US has already prohibited imports of Russian nickel, it introduced a waiver for Russian uranium, allowing purchases due to supply concerns until 2028.

READ MORE: Sanctioning Russian nuclear sector would ‘hurt’ EU – IAEA

Neither the US nor the EU have so far sanctioned Russian titanium. According to an earlier report by the Washington Post, both American and European companies continue to heavily rely on Russia for supplies. The US has so far limited its measures targeting the metal or placing export controls on Russia’s major titanium producer, VSMPO-Avisma. Current restrictions prohibit American exports to the Russian company but allow its titanium into the US.

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