Reuters said that the UAE has become a major trading center for Russian gold since Western sanctions imposed due to the war in Ukraine cut off traditional export routes for Moscow.
Today, Thursday, the agency said that the Russian customs records, which show details of more than a thousand shipments during the past year, show that the UAE imported 75.7 tons of Russian gold, worth $4.3 billion, up from only 1.3 tons during 2021.
The emergence of the UAE as a destination for Russian gold came 6 months after the Ukrainian war, as it received exports worth more than $ 500 million, and Dubai acquires most of the buyers, and the city has long been a center for the trade of precious metals between East and West.
The data shows that Paloma Precious, a gold trading company with offices in the free zone and gold market in Dubai, imported gold worth $109 million.
China and Turkey come after it in the largest destinations; Each imported about 20 tons between February 24, 2022 and March 3, 2023.
Together, the three countries received 99.8% of Russian gold exports, as evidenced by customs data for that period.
In the days after the start of the Ukrainian conflict, many multinational banks and companies providing logistics and refining services for precious metals refrained from dealing with Russian gold, which was usually shipped to London as a center for trading and storing gold.
And the London Gold Bullion Market Association banned Russian manufactured gold from March 7, 2022.
By the end of August, Britain, the European Union, Switzerland, the United States, Canada and Japan banned imports of Russian gold.
But export records show that Russian gold producers quickly found new markets in countries that did not sanction Moscow, such as the UAE, Turkey and China.
On the other hand, the UAE Gold Bullion Market Committee said that the state operates by managing clear and robust operations to combat illegal goods, money laundering and dealing with sanctioned entities.
The committee added that the UAE will continue to trade in an open and fair manner with international partners, while adhering to all existing international norms as defined by the United Nations.
Russia has the world’s fifth-largest gold reserves, estimated at $140 billion, and Russia’s huge reserves of the mineral have been built up.
2023-05-25 18:33:59
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