Trump tells Kyiv to stop hitting Russian refineries as diesel sets a record

President Trump on Sunday called on Ukraine to stop striking Russian refineries, after Kyiv struck several over the weekend, saying the attacks were increasing the price of diesel and ‘hurting the world’³. The Hill reported that he urged Ukraine to halt strikes on Russian oil refineries, warning that rising diesel prices hurt the global economy¹.

The Washington Post reported the appeal as directed at President Volodymyr Zelensky and at Russian energy targets². RFE/RL and The Washington Times carried the same demand^4,7. NV reported Trump saying Ukraine should stop hitting Russia’s energy sector because it is causing diesel shortages⁵.

Why it matters to investors

Diesel prices have hit a record $6.20 amid the US-Iran war and Hormuz disruption⁸. Fox Business described the fuel that powers trucks, farms and freight trains as now threatening to raise costs across the entire US supply chain⁸. That is the link between a battlefield decision and a domestic price level, and it is why the White House is treating Ukrainian targeting as an economic question rather than only a military one^1,3.

Time asked what a halt to refinery strikes would mean for the war itself⁶. Ukraine’s most effective long-range campaign and Washington’s inflation problem now point in opposite directions^5,8.

What to watch

The demand arrives inside an active diplomatic track. Trump’s comment came a week after his envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner visited Kyiv and Moscow in the latest US-mediated effort⁴. On Sept. 5 the envoys met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Russia, and the next day they were in Kyiv⁵. Witkoff said afterwards that he was confident⁶, and the envoys called the Kyiv talks substantive after the Moscow meeting⁹.

Ukraine is preparing for peace talks to resume with the United States and Russia, according to Zelensky’s chief of staff, with the comments coming several days after the Witkoff and Kushner meetings in both capitals¹⁰. Meanwhile a Russian drone hit a train near the Ukraine-Poland border soon after dignitaries had passed through⁹.

The request therefore arrives with leverage attached and a deadline of sorts: talks that both sides describe as substantive are being prepared to resume, and the refinery campaign is one of the few cards Kyiv holds going into them^6,9,10. Whether Ukraine complies, and whether diesel retreats from its record if it does, are the two observable outcomes^1,5,8.