Hundreds of U.S. businesses have exited the Russian market since the start of the invasion, but hundreds more continue to operate in and maintain relationships with the Russian state and its owned and affiliated businesses.
In 2022, American companies generated more than $40 billion in revenue in the Russian market and paid $712 million in taxes to the Russian government, which is more than Vladimir Putin’s government earned from any other country.
Americans have joined in a common cause with the Ukrainian people in their struggle to protect themselves, their freedom, and their sovereignty from Russian aggression while US corporations are helping sustain a critical part of Putin’s economy even as his military troops engaged in the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Major American providers of oilfield services supplied Russia with millions of dollars in equipment for months after its invasion of Ukraine, in an apparent violation of sanctions imposed in an effort to punish the Russian war effort.
A new report found that Russian forces used Iranian-made Shahed-136 UAVs, which contain Western components, to commit alleged war crimes in Ukraine. In two different Shahed-136s shot down in Odesa and Cherkasy in 2022, investigators found components—including microprocessors, semiconductors, transceivers, and memory devices—from 16 companies from the US, Japan, Canada, and Switzerland.
The technology helped keep some of the world’s most challenging oilfields operating in a sector that provided nearly half of Russia’s federal revenues in 2021. Baker Hughes and Halliburton wound down their Russian operations several months after the invasion, but until last week, SLB still sold technology there.
It was “deeply shocking to find a U.S. company continuing to supply equipment to Russia’s oil and gas sector,” said Eleanor Nichol, executive director of B4Ukraine, a coalition of more than 80 nonprofits calling for multinationals to leave the Russian market.
Russia imported more than 5,500 items worth more than $200 million from the top five U.S. firms in the sector — led by SLB, Baker Hughes and Halliburton — in the year following the invasion that began in February 2022.
The largest – SLB, formerly Schlumberger – maintained and even slightly grew its business after others eventually departed.
SLB “announced that it is halting shipments of products and technology into Russia from all SLB facilities worldwide in response to the continued expansion of international sanctions.” This follows SLB’s previous ban on shipments from the United States, United Kingdom, the European Union and Canada into Russia.”
The technology helped keep some of the world’s most challenging oilfields operating in a sector that provided nearly half of Russia’s federal revenues in 2021.
Baker Hughes and Halliburton wound down their Russian operations several months after the invasion, but until last week, SLB still sold technology there.
It was “deeply shocking to find a U.S. company continuing to supply equipment to Russia’s oil and gas sector,” said Eleanor Nichol, executive director of B4Ukraine, a coalition of more than 80 nonprofits calling for multinationals to leave the Russian market.
The American fossil fuel extraction technology helped keep some of the world’s most challenging oilfields running, providing nearly half of Russia’s federal revenues in 2021.