Trump Pushes Zelensky to Stop Attacks on Russian Oil Refineries
President Trump’s surprise
decision to suspend sanctions on Russian diesel fuel stunned Ukrainian and
European officials, who were meeting with U.S. envoys at an exclusive golf club
near Miami.
·
Sanctions
suspended: President Donald Trump’s decision to suspend sanctions on Russian
diesel fuel to reduce energy prices surprised Ukrainian and European officials
during peace talks in Florida.
·
Pressure
on Ukraine: Trump urged President Volodymyr Zelensky to stop attacks on Russian
oil refineries, while Ukraine argued that such strikes were a response to
Russia’s attacks on its energy infrastructure.
·
U.S.
support at risk: The dispute raised concerns over continued American
intelligence and military assistance to Ukraine. Ukrainian officials reportedly
viewed references to U.S. intelligence support as a possible warning.
·
Peace
talks delayed: Trump’s envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, reportedly put
their planned Russia visit on hold pending an improvement in relations between
Trump and Zelensky.
·
Unconfirmed
energy ceasefire: Trump announced that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an
immediate energy ceasefire, but neither side confirmed the agreement. Ukraine
reported further Russian attacks on its energy facilities.
·
European
concern: European leaders expressed support for Zelensky, while a bipartisan
group of six U.S. senators urged the administration to reverse the diesel
decision, arguing that it could help finance Russia’s war.
·
Energy
prices and elections: Trump’s move was linked to efforts to lower diesel prices
ahead of the U.S. midterm elections. The article notes that the war with Iran
was a major factor behind rising energy costs.
·
U.S.
diplomatic strategy: The Trump administration argued that renewed energy trade
with Russia could lower prices and encourage Moscow to return to the global
economy in exchange for compromises in Ukraine peace negotiations.
[ABS News
Service/13.10.2026]
President Trump’s new diplomatic crisis over Ukraine first
erupted at Steve Witkoff’s exclusive golf club outside Miami on Friday.
Senior Ukrainian and European officials had traveled
to the club, Shell Bay, for talks with Mr. Trump’s peace envoys, Mr. Witkoff
and Jared Kushner. They had planned to discuss updated proposals to end the war
in Ukraine ahead of another trip to Russia by Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner.
But Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner soon made an announcement that
stunned the visitors and much of the world when the news became public shortly
thereafter. The United States, the Americans said, would suspend sanctions on
Russian diesel fuel. The Americans added a firm request from Mr. Trump: that
Ukraine stop attacking Russian oil refineries.
One of the Ukrainians asked what they would get in return.
The Americans responded that the United States was doing a lot
for Ukraine already, according to three people familiar with the meeting, and
should not have to make a trade for Ukraine to stop its refinery attacks. The
Americans then mentioned U.S. intelligence assistance, considered vital to the
Ukrainian war effort.
Some in the room heard that as a veiled threat, according to two
of the people. A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss
sensitive diplomacy, denied any suggestion of a threat to withhold such
support. But the official also said that Mr. Trump had grown so angry with
Ukraine that it was hard to say what he might do.
Now, the dispute has ballooned into the biggest crisis between
Washington and Kyiv since the Oval Office blowup with Ukraine’s president last
year. The future of U.S. support for Ukraine again appears to be hanging in the
balance. The escalating back-and-forth showed how Mr. Trump’s efforts to bring
down energy prices before next month’s midterm elections have threatened to
destabilize the fragile Ukraine talks.
Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner are now indicating that they have
put their expected trip to Russia on hold until President Volodymyr Zelensky of
Ukraine mends fences with Mr. Trump, two people familiar with the talks said.
To the Ukrainians and their European supporters, the attacks on
Russia’s fuel refineries are Kyiv’s most effective way to respond to Russia’s
bombardment of Ukraine’s energy grid. Ukraine is prepared to stop attacking
energy infrastructure, Mr. Zelensky has said, if Russia does the same.
Russia has refused such a deal. Nevertheless, to Mr. Trump,
Ukraine’s attacks are an affront to a U.S. administration that has continued to
provide intelligence and some military support to Ukraine despite the American
president’s harsh words about Mr. Zelensky. Diesel prices in particular have
become a sore spot for Mr. Trump, causing
farmers’ costs to spike just as harvest season arrives and the midterms are weeks away.
“He better damn well stop,” Mr. Trump told reporters on
Saturday, referring to Mr. Zelensky and Ukraine’s attacks on Russian
refineries, and ignoring Russia’s strikes on the Ukrainian energy grid. “He
wants to make problems for the world. He wants to make problems for our
farmers, our ranchers.”
Export statistics indicate that the increase in diesel and energy prices stems
largely from Mr. Trump’s war with Iran, though Ukraine’s attacks on Russia have
also played a role.
On Sunday, Mr. Trump said on social media that Russia and
Ukraine had agreed to an “ENERGY CEASEFIRE” with immediate effect. Neither side
confirmed an agreement. A person familiar with his thinking said that Mr. Trump
was referring to a cease-fire only on refineries in both countries — even
though Ukraine’s refining capacity had been all but destroyed early in the war.
“They agreed because I said they agreed,” Mr. Trump asserted at
the White House on Monday, referring to the cease-fire he had announced. He
reiterated his frustration with Mr. Zelensky. “I think, actually, Putin wants
to make a deal more than Zelensky,” the president said.
On Monday, European and Ukrainian leaders suggested that while
they would be open to an energy cease-fire, they were skeptical
that Russia would follow through on one. Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, noted that Russia had attacked Ukrainian energy
infrastructure Sunday night “just hours after” the announcement.
The meeting on Friday at Mr. Witkoff’s golf club lasted about
six hours, two people familiar with it said. Much of the meeting involved
brainstorming about what the future peace talks might require to work, and the
focus was on the standard issues, according to several people. The issues included
accession to the European Union for Ukraine, for instance, and the question of
territorial control.
Mr. Witkoff stepped out at one point to join a call between
Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and Mr. Trump, according to one of the
people, who was in the room for the meeting. In addition to Ukraine’s
three-person negotiating team, the national security advisers to the leaders of
Britain, Germany and France, as well as top officials from the European Union
and NATO, joined the meeting.
But Mr. Trump’s diesel deal with Mr. Putin quickly overshadowed
the rest of the talks. Mr. Zelensky on Friday called Mr. Trump’s deal with Mr.
Putin to allow imports of Russian diesel fuel in order to lower prices a “weak
decision.” As the dispute intensified, Mr. Trump on Saturday said Ukraine
needed “a new president.”
European leaders, including France’s president, Emmanuel Macron,
and the head of the E.U.’s executive arm, Ursula von der Leyen, issued
statements of support for Mr. Zelensky. Members of Congress criticized the
diesel deal as helping fund Russia’s war machine.
“The United States should not provide Putin with a financial
lifeline while Russia continues to kill Ukrainian civilians,” a bipartisan
group of six senators, including the Republicans Susan Collins of Maine and
John Curtis of Utah, said in a statement on Sunday. “The administration must
immediately reverse course.”
Björn Seibert, a senior E.U. official who attended Friday’s
meeting in Florida, gave ambassadors from across the European Union’s 27
nations a briefing on the meeting on Sunday, according to one European official
who was there and three diplomats briefed on the matter.
Both the official and two of the diplomats said that the
Europeans in Florida were taken by surprise by the Trump administration’s
diesel announcement. The official said the ambassadors were stunned by the
announcement.
One major takeaway from Florida, Mr. Seibert told ambassadors,
was that the Americans were engaging more with the Russians than they publicly
acknowledge, the official and one of the diplomats said. No further details on
those engagements were given during Mr. Seibert’s briefing, which lasted about
20 minutes, according to the official.
The Trump administration has argued that energy deals with Mr.
Putin, in addition to lowering energy prices, could help pave the way for a
settlement in Ukraine by showing the Kremlin that reintegration into the world
economy was possible for Russia if it compromised in the war.