China took in half of all the crude oil that Russia exported this year, with India a close second, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said today on state TV.

China now accounts for 45% to 50% of Russian oil and fuel exports, while India is taking in some 40%, Novak said. The increase is particularly remarkable for India, where Russia exported almost no oil whatsoever until 2022. Now, it is the subcontinent’s leading supplier.

“If earlier we exported around 40-45% of our total crude oil and refined products to Europe, by the end of this year we expect this share to have fallen to 4-5%,” Novak said.

The figures suggest that China has essentially replaced Europe as destination for Russian crude and oil products.

Last week, another Deputy PM said that Russia’s oil exports are seen rising 7% this year from 2021 levels.

“The most pressing problems last year have generally been resolved. This firstly concerns payments and cargo insurance, [and] secondly concerns ensuring seaborne shipping of hydrocarbons by tanker fleet,” Alexander Belousov said.

Also last week, Transneft’s head, Nikolay Tokarev, reported that the volume of Russian oil shipments to China this year had surged to some 100 million tons, equal to about 2 million barrels daily.

“Export volumes to China and India have increased significantly; many times over. I can say that about 70 million tonnes of oil were supplied to India this year, while about 100 million tonnes of oil went to China,” Tokarev said.

Indian imports of Russian crude, meanwhile, hit a four-month high in November, at 1.6 million bpd, according to data Reuters reported it had obtained from trade sources. The November imports were 3.1% higher than India’s intake of Russian crude in October and accounted for more than a third of all Indian crude oil imports last month.