Russia is using its oil and gas producer Rosneft as a foreign policy tool, “spreading its influence around the world and challenging the interests of the United States,” Clifford Krauss writes for The New York Times. “The company, which Russia has long relied on to finance its government and social programs, has been pushing deeply into politically sensitive countries like Cuba, China, Egypt and Vietnam, as well as tumultuous places where American interests are at stake.” Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy security expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, says Rosneft is “trying to create opportunities that can be extremely valuable in geopolitical ways … They really give the Russian government unbelievable leverage on questions of importance to the United States.”

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