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US President Donald Trump said on Monday that both Kyiv and Moscow had agreed to pause strikes on energy targets as he sought to shift the blame for rising fuel prices from the Iran war to the war in Ukraine.
“Ukraine has agreed not to hit Russian Energy targets. Russia has agreed to do, likewise!” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social account.
“The World’s Diesel price rise is mostly caused by the Russia/Ukraine War, not Iran,” he added.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has suggested that no deal has been officially confirmed but that Ukraine had “proposed that its partners secure an agreement with Russia that would stop the destruction of critical infrastructure.”
“If our partners are ready to ensure that Russia genuinely refrains from striking our electricity system, other energy facilities, critical infrastructure, and food supply routes, then, of course, we are ready to ensure a corresponding halt to our strikes,” he added.
While both conflicts have produced significant global energy shocks, experts have pointed to the war in the Middle East as having caused considerably larger disruption to the global oil supply.
Oil prices have soared since the start of the conflict in late February, when the US and Israel carried out strikes on Iran.
Iranian forces effectively shut down the Strait of Hormuz – one of the world’s most crucial oil and gas transit chokepoints – in response to the attacks, sending energy markets into chaos.
The Strait, which usually carries around a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil trade, has remained a key sticking point in negotiations between Washington and Tehran, and attacks on vessels navigating the passage are ongoing.
Trump’s announcement comes after he called on Kyiv to halt its attacks on Russian diesel infrastructure during a trip to Ireland over the weekend.
Speaking to reporters, Trump said: “Zelenskyy has to do one thing. He has to stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia.”
“Let him go after targets, but not diesel, because he’s causing a shortage of diesel,” he continued.
Ukraine has ramped up its attacks on Russian energy facilities in recent months as part of Zelenskyy’s “long-range sanctions,” which aim to grind down the Russian economy and hamper the Kremlin’s war machine.
For its part, Russia has launched repeated attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure since it launched its full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022, as Moscow has sought to force Kyiv into submission – particularly over winter periods.
The spike in oil prices has brought rising fuel costs to Americans ahead of November’s key midterm elections, which will determine the makeup of Congress for the final two years of Trump’s term.
In a post on X on Monday, California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, hit out at US Energy Secretary Chris Wright over rising costs.
“Everyone knew Trump’s Iran war would disrupt the Strait of Hormuz and skyrocket costs,” he wrote. “So why did Energy @SecretaryWright do nothing to protect us?”
“Americans are owed answers about what the Trump Admin knew and why they failed to shield us from these predictable consequences,” he added.
