European leaders back Kyiv in dispute over Trump’s energy ceasefire post
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Monday that Ukraine would retaliate against Russia if Moscow continued strikes on its power grid through the winter, in remarks delivered to European security officials gathered in Warsaw. The statement came hours after Russian forces struck a power station in Kharkiv and launched drone attacks that plunged much of Kyiv into darkness, and one day after U.S. President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social about an “energy ceasefire” between Kyiv and Moscow that Zelenskyy said neither side had agreed to.
“If Russia does not agree to an energy ceasefire this winter, we will respond,” Zelenskyy told the summit. He said he had been “surprised” by Trump’s Sunday announcement, which he said went online while Kyiv was being attacked by Russian Shahed drones.
Following Trump’s Truth Social post, Russia launched what The Guardian described as a “targeted attack” on a Kharkiv power station just hours later, as much of Kyiv was plunged into darkness. “It’s clear that Putin does not read Truth Social,” Zelenskyy said at the Warsaw summit.
The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, used a meeting of European foreign ministers on Monday to voice support for Kyiv in the dispute. “We welcome the energy ceasefire when it holds,” Kallas said. “We haven’t yet seen that also Russia will stick to it.”
Ministers from the Baltic states used the same gathering to criticize a separate U.S. decision to lift sanctions on Russian diesel exports. Lithuania’s foreign minister, Keʂtutis Budrys, told reporters: “This deal doesn’t help, neither the crisis of the oil products, nor the unity within the transatlantic community when it concerns Russia. And it is not the European way. Our way is to increase pressure because we already see how it works.”
The sanctions had been imposed as part of punishment for Putin launching the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Trump said the move would reduce global and domestic fuel prices before next month’s U.S. midterm elections.
Zelenskyy called the decision “weak” and said it would generate “billions” in extra revenue for Putin, enabling him to wage war “even more intensely.” Trump, in turn, said Zelenskyy should “damn well stop” hitting Russian refineries. On Saturday, Trump said Ukraine needed a “new leader.”
Responding to Trump’s comments, Zelenskyy said it was up to Ukrainians to choose “one or another leader.” He told ABC News he was willing to accept Trump’s demands and to organize elections, but only if Putin agreed to a “total” 60-day ceasefire.
Trump has blamed the high price of diesel on Ukraine’s attacks on Russian refineries, rather than on the global shock to energy markets from the war in Iran and the subsequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Kallas said Trump’s proposal — for both sides to halt strikes on oil refineries — favored Russia, which she said has far more refineries than Ukraine.
Russia has increased attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure using jet-powered drones and ballistic missiles ahead of the cold winter months, producing blackouts and water shortages far earlier in the season than has been typical during the war, according to The Guardian’s reporting.