Top officials from US President Donald Trump's administration on Sunday defended a recent decision to waive sanctions on Russian diesel, as relations between Washington and Ukraine soured further.
Mr Trump on Friday waived key provisions of a recent package of sanctions against Russia, saying in an executive order that “such a waiver is in the national interests” of the US. The order waived a requirement by him to raise duties on Russian goods imported into the US by up to 500 per cent, and a separate requirement to place tariffs of up to 100 per cent on China, India and other top buyers of Russian energy.
The order was signed two days before the law's implementation deadline and came a week after Mr Trump's surprising decision to lift sanctions on Russian diesel, a move that drew opposition from Europe and his Republican party.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the administration invoked the law's 60-day pause “so we can see what's going on”.
“The only thing that has been lifted is the diesel embargo,” he said.
As part of the diesel deal, Mr Trump last week said Russia would immediately send 300,000 tonnes of diesel to US and global markets, with another 500,000 tonnes in November and 1 million tonnes “immediately thereafter”. The move was quickly condemned by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who said it would help to support Russia's war machine.
The Kremlin on Thursday said Russian diesel had begun to reach global markets after its agreement with Mr Trump.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright told ABC the waiver does not hand Russia an “economic lifeline”. He also dismissed the backlash.
“They are all wrong,” Mr Wright said. “They don’t understand what President Trump’s doing.”
“This is an incentive to Russia that if they can reduce the conflict with Ukraine, they can get an energy ceasefire or reduce the conflict such that they have diesel to export will allow it to flow to world markets. This is a carrot to try to end a war.”
The Trump administration is seeking to lower US diesel prices – which have surged past $6 a gallon ($1.59 a litre) in recent weeks – before the country's midterm elections on November 3.
“Does it come with some short-term political pain? It does. But that's called leadership. President Trump wants to bring peace to the world and drive energy prices down,” Mr Wright said.
But Mr Zelenskyy called the diesel deals “dangerous”, adding it does not have any meaningful influence on US energy prices. He said the Strait of Hormuz's prolonged closure was the driver behind this year's energy price shock.
He also told NBC he believed the US government was responsible for a recent slowdown in US-provided Starlink internet.
He said he believed the decision to limit the internet speed was “the message from [the] American government”. He said Ukraine was “blocked” from US intelligence “for some period of time, and then it was deblocked by the American side”. The Ukrainian leader said during this time his country did not see Russian attacks.
The US has denied it has ordered restrictions on Starlink satellite internet services to Ukraine.
“President Zelenskyy should be very careful about making statements like this that aren't true,” Mr Bessent said.
He also appeared to dodge the question of whether Ukraine was still a US ally.
“President Trump has made it clear that he wants to end this war; that it must stop. And President Zelenskyy presented a false binary this morning that Ukraine must win,” Mr Bessent said.
“The war must end, and that will be with some kind of a negotiated settlement. And President Trump is working on that every day.”
He also said the US supports Ukraine through providing intelligence, the Starlink service, and allowing Nato to buy US arms and resell them to Ukraine.
“We're not providing those to Russia,” he said.
When asked a third time if Ukraine is still a US ally, Mr Bessent said: “I'm not the Secretary of State. I'm not the President.”