Trump’s diesel deal opens a new rift with Europe over Ukraine
Russia has claimed it can supply even more diesel to the global market than the quantities agreed with United States President Donald Trump.
“By the end of the year, we could reach supply volumes of 3.5 million tonnes per month to global markets, just as was the case before the crisis,” Alexander Novak, Russian deputy prime minister, told the news programme Vesti on Monday.
President Vladimir Putin and Trump spoke on Friday on an agreement expected to bring 300,000 tonnes of diesel to global markets in October, half a million tonnes in November, and a million tonnes in December.
“Diesel Prices for Americans and, indeed, the World, will be COMING DOWN, IN RECORD NUMBERS, AND FAST!” Trump posted.
But experts are sceptical, and the move has opened a rift between the US and Europe on the Ukraine war.
Kostis Stambolis, executive director of the Institute of Energy for South-East Europe (IENE), described the US move as “purely political” and designed to put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a corner.
Trump wants to signal that the US has “no problem with Russia”, unlike Europe, he said.
“Russia produces 5.8 million tonnes of diesel a month. Two million are likely to be available for export,” he added.
Europe has reacted to the diesel deal by backing Ukraine, whose war funding will be “front and centre” of this week’s European Council summit, European Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen said on Sunday.
Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen on Monday called on Europeans to ban all tourist visas to Russians.
Stambolis believes Trump was leveraging European weakness to shift its position on Ukraine.
“About 30 European refineries have closed in the past 15 years for environmental reasons, because they have to pay to emit greenhouse gases,” he said, referring to Europe’s Emissions Trading Scheme, “so now Europe is not self-sufficient in products”.
Trump is showing the Europeans “he doesn’t want to deal with Europe and to hell with them … This is opening the rift between the US and the EU further,” said Stambolis.
Ukraine says it has destroyed roughly half of Russia’s refining capacity, forcing Moscow to stop exporting lucrative petroleum products which help it to finance its war.
It has also bombed Russian tankers carrying crude oil to global markets.
Zelenskyy said the strategy was effective, and Trump’s deal, which would suspend sanctions on Russian oil products until April 2027, undermined it.
“Gifts to Putin will not lead to peace,” Zelenskyy said Saturday. “Any weakening of sanctions against Russia without a clear and lasting de-escalation agreement with Russia is an obvious sign of weakness.”
Although Trump announced an energy ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine on Sunday, leading Ukraine to suspend its attacks on refineries, Russian strikes pounded Kyiv’s energy grid and killed 12 people in Dnipropetrovsk.
“I do not think he has earned a respite,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said of Zelenskyy.
Europe supports Ukraine’s economic strategy against Russia’s war machine, but Trump has blamed it for raising petrol prices at the pump for Americans as he heads into Congressional midterm elections in early November.
“[Zelenskyy] wants to make problems for our farmers, our ranchers, with diesel fuel because Russia supplies a large portion of the diesel fuel throughout the world,” Trump told reporters in the White House after Zelenskyy’s reaction.
Politics over economics
Trump has followed a seemingly self-contradictory policy towards Russia.
He cut US military aid to Ukraine when he assumed power in January 2025, but agreed to sell Europe weapons to help Ukraine.
He had a public dispute with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office in February 2025, saying “You don’t have the cards,” but at the NATO summit this year said Zelenskyy had “done an amazing job” and “been very effective”.
Last month, Trump signed the Lindsey Graham Act, which would allow him to punish countries buying Russian oil. Eleven days later, he reversed policy.
