Walking a tightrope: Ukraine war puts Japan’s energy security on thin ice

TOKYO — Sakhalin-2, an oil and gas project in Russia’s Far East, was once an expression of faith in Russia’s global future. Launched at the beginning of the century, it was then the largest foreign investment deal in the Russian Federation, uniting global oil majors and Japanese conglomerates like Shell and Mitsui & Co. They brought the latest technology to what was one of the world’s greatest oil and gas development challenges. On the barren volcanic island of Sakhalin, 40 km from Japan’s northern coast, the project combined offshore oil platforms with Russia’s first liquefied natural gas plant.