Russia, the world's biggest exporter of energy, may reduce oil production and will refuse to sell oil to countries with the West's price cap on Russian oil, President Vladimir Putin said on Friday.
Putin said to reporters in Bishkek that they had already said that they simply won't sell to those countries that make such decisions.
We will think if necessary, about the possible reduction in production. Putin said that Russia had an agreement with OPEC about production, so a drastic step was still only a possibility.
There are no solutions yet for this, and we are thinking about it. Putin said concrete steps will be outlined in the decree of the president of Russia, which will be released in the next few days.
Putin said that Moscow would not lose out on the West's price cap and that the government's finances would hold up fine.
He said the West's move was stupid and that energy prices would skyrocket for those who imposed caps.
He said Moscow was preparing a response that would be announced in the coming days.