Ukraine attacked a Russian oil refinery Thursday, abandoning a brief truce involving energy-related targets that it said Moscow did not heed, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he felt betrayed by US President Donald Trump.
Zelensky said he was outraged by Russia’s continuing aerial bombardment of energy infrastructure in apparent defiance of Trump’s demand on Sunday for both sides to halt those attacks. On Thursday, Trump openly declared his dislike of Zelensky in an interview with Newsmax, criticizing him for resuming strikes on Russia’s energy infrastructure and for not wanting to settle with Russian leader Vladimir Putin. The strike could further complicate Kyiv’s relations with Trump, which have soured again in recent days amid deepening tensions between Ukraine and Washington. Despite going along with Trump’s demand for a truce, Zelensky complained, Ukraine in recent days was denied the usual Western intelligence on Russian ballistic missile strikes, and limits were placed on its use of US-made Starlink communication terminals. Both are vital for the Ukrainian military. It wasn’t possible to independently verify each side’s claims. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov labeled Ukraine’s strikes on oil facilities as a “direct and crude challenge to President Trump. Another point of tension with Ukraine is a deal Trump made with Russian President Vladimir Putin to import Russian diesel, despite international efforts to sanction Russia for its invasion and diplomatically isolate Putin. “I’m not a big fan of Zelensky. They’ve destroyed that country.
Because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly, confirmed that Ukraine had hit the refinery, a senior Ukrainian official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The drone strike started a fire at the refinery about 300 kilometers (180 miles) southeast of Moscow in Russia’s Ryazan region, according to the Russian Defense Ministry and Ryazan Governor Pavel Malkov.
Russia’s Astra online news outlet posted what it said was a photograph of the blaze. He said his patience had run out, telling the Financial Times in an interview published Thursday that Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil refineries would resume. “We’re done,” Zelensky was quoted as saying. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Ukraine never stopped its strikes on refineries. “Zelensky is not a good guy for us to deal with,” Trump said. The US president added, “I think I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin.”
The previous day, he visited London, where he won pledges of more help from UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham. Amid fears that the Trump administration may be withdrawing support for Ukraine, Zelensky went to Brussels on Thursday for talks with European Union leaders attending a two-day summit. Elon Musk noted on X that the military version of Starlink, called Starshield, is controlled by the US military and Trump. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive situation. The Pentagon has not answered questions about the slowdown from The Associated Press either. The absence of Western intelligence leaves Ukraine more vulnerable to Russian ballistic missiles. Asked whether the EU still trusts Trump, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, replied: “We definitely have a different approach to this war. We see that we have to pressure the aggressor to stop the war, not the victim to surrender. “It is important that everyone in America stand not with the aggressor, but with our efforts to protect lives, end this war and guarantee security.
Because of its size, trump suggested that Ukraine should hold an election to replace Zelensky as he suggested that Russia had a military edge. Because it came from the US, the president, who was not asked about the Starlink issue or intelligence sharing in the interview, added that Ukraine had the best military equipment. In other developments, three people were killed and six others injured after the Kirovohrad region of central Ukraine came under a Russian drone attack lasting more than 10 hours, Ukraine’s Emergency Services said Thursday. Between midnight and Thursday morning, Russia launched more than 850 drones at Ukraine, Zelenskyy said on X. Russian aerial attacks hit 15 Ukrainian regions, he said. Ukrainian air defenses stopped 536 Russian drones during a large-scale overnight attack, the Ukrainian air force said, but impacts were recorded at 31 locations. The Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses downed 166 Ukrainian drones overnight and that Russian forces hit two vessels carrying military cargo. (Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
A Ukrainian official said the country has not received an explanation from SpaceX, the company that maintains the Starlink satellites, or the Pentagon, on the slowdown. Trump has said the US hasn’t stopped sharing intelligence with Ukraine. Zelenskyy said he would meet with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, French President Emmanuel Macron, and the prime ministers of Poland, Denmark and Belgium. “Squeezing Ukraine is not the right approach, and that is why Europe is standing beside Ukraine,” Kallas told reporters. He added that the barrage came “precisely at a time when the speed of our defensive capabilities is being artificially restricted,” an apparent reference to the Starlink restrictions on drones. “It is obvious that Russia deliberately chose to escalate its attacks after receiving sanctions relief and seeing attempts to pressure Ukraine,” Zelensky said. A Ukrainian missile destroyed six warplanes at an airfield in southwestern Russia, Zelensky said. The aircraft were used to launch powerful glide bombs, he said. “Russia is dragging out the war, so our long-range operations will continue,” he said on social media.
US efforts under Trump to end the war have made no progress. “It’s painful when President Trump chooses one side, not our side. Zelensky slammed the agreement, saying it would allow Russia to press on with its full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began more than 4 and a half years ago.
In an interview late Wednesday with Piers Morgan on the British journalist’s YouTube show, Zelensky said he felt betrayed by Trump’s deal with Putin, the energy ceasefire announcement and the Starlink limits that restricted the use of Ukrainian drones. Asked if he felt betrayed by the American president, he said, “Really, yes, between us. “Our country has to survive, and we count on our real partners, strategic partners, the United States and President Trump,” Zelensky told Morgan. He said the behavior of the US, including restricting the Starlink system, “was really strange. In the same interview, Zelensky said Ukraine was “losing a strong partner” in the United States. But we are OK that he’s in the middle,” he said. Zelensky said someone is pushing Trump into a stance that is “not the right side of history.”
