According to the Kommersant news outlet, government sources revealed the Russian government is considering a decree which would ban exporters from selling any oil to buyers under the Western Price Cap system.

The report detailed that the Ministry of Energy has prepared a draft decree which will require all legal entities and individuals to eliminate any mention of Western oil price caps in their contracts with potential buyers. In addition, the decree will mandate that those buyers, including traders and agents, are also required to exclude any mention of the price caps in their contracts, should they seek to resell the oil on to other parties.

All contracts will have to be reviewed by the Federal Customs Service under the new decree. The agency will have the power to ban export of any products specified in the contracts, if it should find any mention of the price cap in the contract, or any other violation.

Sources said the draft document has not been officially approved by the government yet, and the Ministry of Energy has not had any comment on the report.

Introduced by the G7, the EU, and Australia, the price cap mechanism on Russian oil went into effect on December 5th. It bans western companies from offering shipping-related services such as insurance, brokerage, or other services, to any vessels transporting oil which was sold at a price higher than the price cap of $60 per barrel. In March the cap will be reviewed, and may be revised, since Russian oil is already trading below that level. There is another price cap being prepared for Russian petroleum products, however its details are still being worked out.

Russia has strongly resisted the concept of the price cap, promising to not deal with any nation which seeks to impose it. President Vladimir Putin singed a decree last month which banned the delivery of oil and oil products to any foreign buyer which mentioned the price cap in their contracts, “directly or indirectly.” The ban is effective for five months, from February 1st to July 1st, 2023. The decree also applied retroactively to contracts signed prior to February 1st, if they mentioned the price cap.