Russia hit at least six energy targets during a night and morning of deadly airstrikes across Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday, adding this showed Moscow had no interest in an energy ceasefire announced by Donald Trump.
Under pressure over high energy prices ahead of US midterm elections next month, US President Trump blindsided Kyiv and its European allies over the weekend by declaring that Ukraine and Russia had agreed not to hit each other's energy systems.
"It is increasingly evident that Russia is unwilling to accept an energy ceasefire proposed by the United States and intends to continue its terrorist air attacks against our people and communities," Zelenskiy said on X.
"This is what happens when Russia sees the prospect of higher revenues for its war machine."
In earlier comments by video link to a conference in Poland, Zelenskiy identified two of the targets as a gas facility and a petrol station, both hit by Russian drones.
Trump announced the purported energy ceasefire days after unveiling a deal to buy diesel from Russia, which Zelenskiy has criticised as a reversal of years of Western policy aimed at isolating Russia's economy.
Trump, for his part, has called on Ukrainians to unseat Zelenskiy in an election, an unusually severe exchange in a relationship between the two leaders that has been strained since Trump returned to power in 2025.
Trump's announcement was the second time within a few weeks that Trump has declared an energy ceasefire without confirmation from the two warring sides.
Ukraine's European allies on Monday voiced scepticism of any such agreement, spoke strongly in support of Kyiv and approved the largest set of EU sanctions since Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022.
'WE DO NOT WANT A CEASEFIRE,' KREMLIN SAYS
Kyiv has increasingly targeted Russian oil refineries and logistics with long-range strikes in recent months, its answer to more than four-and-a-half years of relentless Russian attacks on its cities, including persistent campaigns to knock out Ukraine's power and heat in successive winters.
Zelenskiy said Ukraine had carried out no attacks on Russian refineries overnight and was willing to agree an energy ceasefire, but only if Russia abided by it. He also said elections, suspended during wartime, could be held in Ukraine if Moscow agreed to a full ceasefire for 60 days.
Russia, for its part, said talks were ongoing about a possible energy ceasefire, and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said further information would be revealed in due course. But he rejected Zelenskiy's proposal for a full 60-day truce.
"In the Kremlin, both President (Vladimir) Putin and officials at other levels have repeatedly stated that we do not want a ceasefire," said Peskov. "We want long-term peace and are prepared to do everything possible to achieve it."
BODY AMONG WRECKAGE
In Kharkiv, Ukraine's second biggest city, rescue workers picked through wreckage of shattered buildings. The body of a dead civilian in jeans and white sneakers lay beneath debris, lit up by floodlights in the nighttime dark.
Nataliia Minka said she had just made it to a shelter when a missile struck nearby. She and her child had seen what they believed to be a missile hitting a nearby power station.
“Ten minutes had passed since they promised they wouldn’t target energy facilities," she said.
“It’s so hard to describe how a child was lying there, already covered up, and the father was running around her, crying and screaming," she added. "It’s so terrifying -- it’s impossible to get through something like this.”
After nighttime attacks killed at least three people in Kharkiv, further strikes took place in the morning, hitting residential buildings and wounding at least 22 more people, municipal officials said. At least three other people were reported killed on Sunday in the western city of Ivano-Frankivsk.
Russia began its latest strike campaign on Ukraine's grid two weeks ago, already causing daily, hours-long power cuts in Kyiv, affecting the capital's water and sewage systems and twice bringing its underground trains to an abrupt halt.
To maintain pressure on Moscow, European Union foreign ministers on Monday added 1,569 new names to their sanctions list of banned individuals and businesses, billed as the largest single package to date.
Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Moscow "will only negotiate seriously under pressure, which is why we are sticking to our sanctions against Russia.
"Following Moscow's ruthless attacks on Ukraine's civilian energy infrastructure, we must actually tighten them further."
Trump has increasingly blamed Kyiv's attacks on Russian refineries for surging global costs for fuel, especially diesel, which has hit record prices in the United States since he launched his military campaign against Iran. On Saturday he said Zelenskiy had "better damn well stop" attacking Russian refineries.
A person familiar with the situation said the US had threatened to cut off intelligence sharing with Ukraine and supplies of weapons, which Washington no longer provides to Kyiv but allows European countries to buy on its behalf.
Source: Reuters
--Agencies
