Trump-Zelenskyy rift deepens over Russia fuel deal and peace talks

On day 1,691 of Russia's war in Ukraine, the alliance holding Kyiv's defense began to fracture visibly. Donald Trump, freshly into his presidency, had just brokered a deal allowing Russian diesel back onto global markets—a move that infuriated Zelenskyy—and then called publicly for Ukraine to find a new leader. The timing was not accidental. It was a pressure campaign, delivered in real time, with the weight of American power behind it.

Trump's demands came in two parts, both delivered to reporters at the White House on Saturday. First, he ordered Zelenskyy to stop striking Russian oil refineries. "He better damn well stop," Trump said, his language leaving no room for negotiation. Second, and more destabilizing, he suggested Ukraine's president was the obstacle to peace. "Russia would like to make a deal," Trump told the press, "but for whatever reason, Zelenskyy does not want to make a deal." He claimed Putin had told him during a Friday phone call that Moscow wanted a settlement "strongly." No evidence was offered for Zelenskyy's alleged resistance. The accusation hung in the air anyway, reshaping the diplomatic landscape.

Zelenskyy had already reacted with fury to the fuel deal itself. He called it "terrible" and "not fair and not honest"—language that suggested not just disagreement but a sense of betrayal. The deal, struck between Trump and Putin, would ease Russia's economic isolation by allowing its oil products back into world markets. It was a concession that undercut the sanctions regime Ukraine had relied on to weaken Moscow's war machine. And it came as Russian forces were actively killing Ukrainian civilians. On the day Trump made his calls, Russian strikes killed twenty people, including three children.

But Trump's pressure did not stand alone. Within hours, the international response began to crystallize around Zelenskyy. Britain's Prime Minister Andy Burnham called his Ukrainian counterpart to offer what Downing Street described as "complete solidarity." In their conversation, Burnham acknowledged that the past day had been difficult for Ukraine and reaffirmed Britain's commitment to maintaining pressure on Russia. The two leaders agreed to meet in person within days. Germany, too, signaled it would not follow Trump's lead. Despite Moscow's new fuel agreement with Washington, Berlin said it would continue pushing for new European Union sanctions against Russia and would maintain its "unfailing" support for Ukraine's defense.

Ukraine's foreign minister, Andriy Sybiga, offered the most direct response to Trump's call for Zelenskyy's replacement. "He has the support of the Ukrainian people, and they have the right to decide," Sybiga said on Saturday. "Statements from abroad only confirm that he is doing his job well. He deserves support." The statement was measured but unmistakable: Ukraine's leadership was not America's to choose.

Meanwhile, the machinery of potential negotiation was already moving. American negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who had been leading Trump's efforts to broker a Ukraine peace agreement, were reportedly preparing a visit to Moscow within the next two weeks, according to Russian state news. A Ukrainian delegation that had traveled to Miami for talks on ending the war was heading home on Saturday, an adviser to Zelenskyy confirmed. The talks had apparently yielded nothing that would justify staying.

In Moscow, Trump's call for Zelenskyy's removal was welcomed as a gift. Kirill Dmitriev, the Kremlin's special envoy on economic cooperation, posted on social media that Trump's remarks were "historic." He framed them as evidence that Trump understood Ukraine needed "leadership actually focused on peace"—a formulation that treated Zelenskyy's resistance to Russian demands as an obstacle rather than a defense of Ukrainian sovereignty.

Russia's military, for its part, continued its campaign against Ukrainian civilians and infrastructure. The defense ministry claimed its drones had struck a data-processing center in Kyiv used by Ukraine's armed forces and a cargo ship carrying military supplies to the port of Odesa. It also reported capturing two settlements in the Kharkiv region, though Reuters could not independently verify these claims. The war ground on, indifferent to the diplomatic turbulence above it.