A rivalry at the heart of Russia's oil trade is threatening the crucial operations the Kremlin relies on to fund its war in Ukraine, just as the US cranks up the pressure on Moscow.

The two players who are estimated to move the vast majority of the state-owned Rosneft PJSC’s crude have been trying to expose each other's Russian links in a bid to trigger Western sanctions, according to people familiar with the matter and documents seen by Bloomberg News.

The dispute between Murtaza Lakhani, a veteran oil trading tycoon, and two Azeri competitors, Etibar Eyyub and Tahir Garayev, is costing Rosneft and the Russian state billions of dollars in increased costs and discounted prices, according to the people and documents, and has even landed on the desk of CEO Igor Sechin.

With the US this we

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