Russia Turns Asia’s Oil Shock Into an Indonesian Opening

Russia Turns Asia’s Oil Shock Into an Indonesian Opening

Russia has emerged as one of the clearest commercial beneficiaries of the US-Israel war with Iran. Before March 2026, buying Russian crude was widely treated as a sanctions risk that only Chinese and, to a lesser extent, Indian private companies could comfortably absorb. The first US waiver for Russian barrels, announced on March 12, changed that calculation. It showed that, during a major Middle Eastern supply disruption, Asia could not balance…