Indian Oil Corp (IOC) IOC.NS has excluded several high-sulphur crude grades, including Russian Urals, from its latest tender, trade sources said.

India’s top refiner informed market participants that Das, Eugene Island, Thunder Horse and Urals crude were no longer on the list of grades under its latest tender, which closes on Tuesday, the sources said.

IOC imports crude for itself and on behalf of its Chennai Petroleum CHPC.NS subsidiary.

U.S. President Joe Biden had told Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi late on Monday that buying more oil from Russia was not in India’s interest and could hamper the U.S. response to the war in Ukraine.

IOC did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

The refiner is running two tenders this week, seeking sweet and sour crude separately for May-June loading.

In previous tenders, IOC bought 6 million barrels of Russian Urals for May loading.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Nidhi Verma in New Delhi and Florence Tan in Singapore Editing by David Goodman)