SOURCE :- THE AGE NEWS
Washington: Donald Trump said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “better damn well stop” striking Russia’s diesel refineries and called for the wartime leader to leave office, as relations between the two sink to fresh lows over skyrocketing diesel prices.
The US president on Friday struck a deal to buy Russian diesel, upending years of sanctions against Moscow, though it was not evident that Vladimir Putin could fulfil his end of the deal, given he is struggling to fuel his own economy.
On Saturday (US time), Trump again lashed out at Zelensky, blaming him for the ongoing war that was started by Russia, and calling for him to be replaced as president.
“Zelensky could have settled this war many times – many, many times. He chooses not to. Very difficult,” Trump told reporters while leaving the White House for a rally on Tennessee.
“We said you can do whatever you want to Russia, don’t hit the refineries because that’s a world problem that’s caused. He wants to make problems for the world, he wants to make problems for our farmers, our ranchers.”
Ukraine has pummelled Russian energy infrastructure in an attempt to cripple Putin’s economy and deprive Moscow of funding for the war. Russia has imposed a diesel export ban as it battles to fuel its own needs.
But the diesel shortage has flowed through the world economy and contributed to rising prices in the US just weeks before the midterm elections, in which energy costs – primarily petrol prices – are a major issue for American consumers, farmers and industry.
Trump has repeatedly called on Zelensky to halt strikes against Russia’s energy infrastructure.
“We told him ‘do whatever you want but don’t hit the diesel fuel’ … and what does he do, he goes and hits the diesel fuel. He can do whatever he wants, but he can’t do that,” Trump said Saturday.
“He’s not going to affect our farmers, and he’s not going to affect our ranchers, and he’s not going to affect the rest of the world. He better damn well stop.”
The US president then went further, calling for Zelensky to go. “You know what I suggest? I suggest they get a new leader who can make a deal. He could have made many deals and for some reason he never does.
“That’s a war that should have never started, and I think it’s time for Ukraine to get a new president.”
The comments represent arguably the lowest point in relations between Trump and Zelensky since the infamous Oval Office meeting in late February last year, early in Trump’s second term, when Vice President JD Vance said Zelensky was ungrateful for US support.
The leaders raised their voices at each other, and the encounter ended with Zelensky being forced to depart the White House early.
While relations improved later, Trump has routinely blamed the Ukrainian president for either starting the war – which began when Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine – or failing to accept a deal to end the conflict.
Such deals would have involved Ukraine ceding significant amounts of territory to Russia, even land that was not fully occupied by Russian forces.
Zelensky has shied away from directly criticising Trump since that tempestuous Oval Office meeting, but on Friday he called the diesel deal “weak” and unfair, and a birthday gift to Putin.
On Saturday, 20 people, including three children, were killed in a Russian attack on the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia. It has been a regular target of Russian bombardment, with strikes intensifying in the past few months.
A 6-year-old girl was among those killed when one strike reduced part of an apartment block to rubble. Her grandfather, Anatoliy Chumniy, stood sobbing over her body, laid on the ground in a white bag, after rescuers pulled it from the wreckage.“Her birthday would have been at the end of the month,” he said through tears.
Zelensky said the strikes on Zaporizhzhia were a “thank you” for the lifting of sanctions on diesel exports.
As anger brewed among Republicans about Trump’s diesel deal with Putin, former vice president Mike Pence said the decision made “no sense” and betrayed the legacy of the late Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who fought for fresh sanctions on Russia and its trading partners before his sudden death in July.
“Putin is losing this war,” Pence said. “Ukraine has fought the Russian military to a standstill and reinvented warfare with drones taking the fight into the heart of Russia.
“America should not be throwing a lifeline to Putin’s war machine. Now is the time to stand strong against Russian aggression as we did during the first Trump administration.”
Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political reporter in Canberra.Connect via X or email.
