Geopolitics · UB-023
Trump's Russian diesel deal strains allies as Ukraine calls it a gift to Putin
Published 14-10-2026 · UB-023 · 🇺🇸🇷🇺🇺🇦🇬🇧 · ✓ 6 linked sources
Donald Trump, 2025. Photo: Daniel Torok / The White House, public domainThe US temporarily waived sanctions on Russian diesel to ease record fuel prices, drawing criticism from Kyiv, US lawmakers and strain with London.
President Donald Trump said on 09-10-2026, after a phone call with Vladimir Putin, that Russia would release diesel onto world markets to ease record fuel prices. The US Treasury issued a general licence temporarily waiving sanctions on Russian diesel through April 2027, CNBC reported.
Trump said Russia would immediately supply 300,000 tons, according to The Hill, and CNBC reported he put the total at more than 4 million tons, with a further 3 million depending on the state of Russia's refineries. US diesel averaged $6.28 a gallon that day, against $3.68 a year earlier, according to AAA figures cited by The Hill.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned the move, saying the revenue would fund Russia's war, and told Axios the deal was neither fair nor honest. Lawmakers from both US parties also criticised it, but Trump defended the decision on 12-10-2026, CNBC reported.
In London, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband described a very difficult few days for UK–US relations, BBC News reported. Trump has said both sides agreed to stop striking energy infrastructure, but neither Moscow nor Kyiv confirmed it, and Russia hit Ukraine's power grid again on 14-10-2026, Reuters reported.