Relations between Ukraine and the United States face increasing tensions over intelligence sharing, sanctions, Ukraine’s attacks on Russian energy, and a path to peace.
Mutual distrust appears to be deepening between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky.
Trump on Monday accused Zelenskiy of not knowing what he was talking about and suggested that “it’s time for someone else to negotiate on Ukraine’s behalf.”
Over the weekend, Kiev launched the year’s largest drone attack on Russia, hitting a major oil terminal, ignoring President Trump’s demands for Ukraine to stop attacking Russian refineries.
With diesel prices at record highs, the White House is seeking to ease pressure on U.S. oil and diesel prices ahead of crucial midterm elections.
President Trump last week called Kiev’s attack on a Russian oil refinery a “disgrace” and said Zelenskiy was harder to deal with than Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
“It’s better to have a partner who is very open and articulate than a partner who is a murderer even if he has a smile on his face,” Zelenskiy shot back in an interview on Sunday, an apparent reference to President Trump’s ties to Russia.
President Trump criticized Zelenskiy again on Sunday, claiming in a post on Truth Social that he “doesn’t want this war to end and probably never will.”
Relations now appear to be at their lowest ebb since an explosive meeting at the White House 18 months ago.
President Zelenskiy has consistently stated that he is open to peace negotiations if Ukraine’s security can be ensured.
Ukraine’s president said he met with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner on Sunday as part of “nonstop communication” toward the goal of peace.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gare Stoer said the three were scheduled to meet again on Tuesday, with Zelenskiy and Witkov scheduled to meet in the Norwegian capital, Oslo. Mr. Kushner will participate in the meeting remotely.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that he hoped Witkov, his team, and President Putin would meet in the near future so that the U.S. side could brief the Russian leader “about its contacts with both Ukrainians and Europeans.”
CNN has reached out to the White House for comment on the meeting.
“We are doing everything in our power to make this happen and to ensure that America’s position is strong and brings peace closer,” President Zelenskiy wrote on X.
President Zelenskiy added on Monday: “Ukraine did not want this war. We have literally welcomed every attempt by our partners to end this war with dignity.”
According to the Vatican, President Zelenskiy also met with Pope Leo XIV on Monday.
The Pope met with the Ukrainian president just days after his phone call with Putin, expressing concern about the “grave humanitarian situation” in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Oreshki. Ukrainian authorities say around 2,000 civilians are stranded in the city without food and basic medicine.
President Trump has defended recent sanctions concessions to Russia, including waiving Russian diesel export permits and exempting Russia from broader economic sanctions mandated by the U.S. Congress.
“I’m in the middle of peace negotiations in the war between Russia and Ukraine, and I don’t want to foolishly push Russia away from the negotiating table,” Trump said in a post on Sunday.
President Zelenskiy said in an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday that the exemption would strengthen President Putin’s war against Ukraine while the Russian military is failing on the battlefield.
There are growing fears in Kiev and Europe that the Trump administration will make further concessions to Moscow to get Putin to agree to a peace deal.
President Zelenskiy told “Meet the Press” that it would be a “historic mistake” for the United States to side with Russia. He said he wants to trust President Trump and hopes he will change his attitude toward Putin.
Asked if Trump was an ally of Ukraine, Zelenskiy said: “I hope so.”
Zelenskiy made his appeal directly to the U.S. Congress on Monday, holding an online meeting with a group of lawmakers from both parties. He described the current situation as “the most difficult since this war began” and said: “It appears that some political decision has been made to delay aid to us.”
Ukraine is also shaken by reports that trilateral talks involving the United States and China could be held next month to resolve the conflict without Ukraine’s involvement.
“I think there has been talk of talks. I don’t know if anything has been finalized,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday during a visit to Uzbekistan.
President Trump said Monday that he would consider a three-way meeting with President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, but said the sit-in would focus on denuclearization, not the war between Russia and Ukraine.
But Ukraine criticized the idea, with Foreign Minister Andriy Sibikha saying on Monday that such talks would not help peace and would “only have the opposite effect of encouraging Putin to continue this war.”
“Inviting President Putin to such a meeting would stimulate President Putin’s desire for self-aggrandizement and give him an undeserved status,” Sibikha wrote to X.
The Kremlin said on Monday that “no concrete proposals or agreements have been discussed or proposed by anyone, either regarding the meeting itself or its potential agenda and content.”
Despite President Trump’s demands, Ukraine continues to launch long-range attacks on Russia. One of our goals for the weekend was the oil terminal in St. Petersburg. The terminal can handle up to 12.5 million tonnes per year. Ukraine’s Fire Point, which manufactures the drone used in the attack, said a fire broke out on the terminal premises after the attack.
Russian distribution company Ozone said its St. Petersburg distribution center and the data center of Russian social media platform Vkontakte were also attacked.
Local authorities said one person was killed, five others were injured and a home was damaged in the attack.
A week ago, President Trump said Russia and Ukraine had agreed to stop attacking each other’s energy infrastructure.
Neither Kyiv nor Moscow recognized such an agreement. Although Ukraine temporarily halted these attacks, Russia never stopped attacking Ukrainian energy facilities and cities.
“Since the US president announced the energy ceasefire a week ago, Russia has deliberately attacked Ukraine’s energy, oil and gas sector 76 times,” Zelenskiy wrote on X Sunday.
President Zelenskiy announced on Monday that six people, including three children, were killed in a Russian drone strike in the Kharkiv region. Zelenskyy shared a blurry photo of one of the victims, a small child in a stroller, and said the horrifying image showed “the truth of this war.”
“Life has to be protected. Ukraine needs air defense. We can’t even think about making money with Russia as long as they continue to wage stupid wars,” he told X.
There has also been criticism of the reduction in US satellite information provided to the Ukrainian military.
President Zelenskiy reiterated on Sunday that changes to billionaire Elon Musk’s Starlink system are limiting the speed of the company’s short-range and battlefield drones, describing it as a “message from the American government.”
Musk said last week that the system is owned and controlled by the U.S. government, and only the government can make decisions to set limits on its speed or usage.
The Trump administration has denied ordering service restrictions. President Trump said Monday that he doesn’t know who is imposing the restrictions, but “I want to know.”
Similarly, the Trump administration pushed back on Kiev’s accusations that information about incoming ballistic missiles was not shared.
President Zelenskyy said on Monday that Kiev received no advance warning of the ballistic missile attack on Sunday night, although Zelenskyy claims that such things have occurred multiple times in the past week.
“Once again, Russian ballistic missile attacks came in waves overnight, and once again there was no early warning from our partners.”
The US satellite network is critical in providing warning of incoming missiles to the Ukrainian military. Russian ballistic missile attacks aim to destroy civilian life and destroy critical infrastructure.
“I don’t know where he’s getting these things, I don’t know why he’s saying these things to reporters,” Rubio told reporters Monday. “You should go back and ask him. There’s no time.”
“What he should focus on, and what we want to focus on, is ending this war. That’s what he should focus on,” Rubio said of Zelensky.
Kyiv and Washington see very different paths to that goal.
CNN’s Daria Tarasova, Anna Chernova, Julia Benbrook, Jennifer Hansler, Christopher Lamb, Kristen Holmes and Ivana Kottasova contributed to this report.
