Russia has turned down the "energy truce" announced by US President Donald Trump, with the Kremlin saying it is not interested in a ceasefire at all. The rejection came as a Russian missile strike on a residential area near Kharkiv killed three people, according to Ukrainian police cited by Il Fatto Quotidiano.
The truce Trump described was meant to take effect immediately and to be honored by both Moscow and Kyiv, halting attacks on refineries. It did not hold. By Monday afternoon, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had struck six energy facilities across the country that day and that 33 people had been wounded nationwide.
Why it matters
The collapse of the announcement leaves the war's most vulnerable infrastructure — power plants, grids and refineries — inside the firing line on both sides. It also exposes how far apart Washington, Moscow and Kyiv remain, even when a deal is publicly declared.
For Ukraine, the stakes are immediate: repeated strikes on generation and distribution networks have produced blackouts in several regions. For Russia, the question is whether continued attacks on Ukrainian energy sites outweigh the cost of US pressure and new European sanctions.
The Kremlin's answer
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said Russia does not want a truce but "a lasting peace," and that Moscow is ready to do everything possible to achieve one. He tied the question of Ukraine's leadership directly to that goal, saying Zelensky must make "very important and very difficult decisions" to stop the war, and that the Ukrainian president either takes on that responsibility and shows political will or does not.
Peskov also said that if Kyiv genuinely wants to hold elections, Vladimir Putin would be ready that day to order a halt to attacks on Ukraine. He dismissed European governments as belonging to "the party of war" rather than the party of peace, speaking after EU foreign ministers adopted nearly 1,600 new sanctions measures targeting Russia's military-industrial complex.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was blunter about Zelensky, saying he did not believe the Ukrainian leader deserved a truce. Lavrov said Moscow would not be misled again by assurances and promises, and that Russia would keep pursuing the objectives of what it calls its special military operation — goals he said have never changed, unlike what he described as Zelensky's reversals and those of his European patrons.
A proposal Kyiv calls one-sided
Trump's announcement referred to a possible arrangement in which both sides would stop striking refineries. According to Axios, cited by Il Fatto Quotidiano, the "refinery for refinery" formula Trump described in a post on his Truth Social platform is unbalanced: Ukraine has a single oil refining plant, which has been hit repeatedly by Russian forces and is not fully operational, while Russia operates a large network of refineries.
Axios reported that the White House has warned that Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries are damaging relations between Zelensky and Trump. One official said the US president is furious and believes Zelensky takes America for granted.
Zelensky had initially described the truce as a development he had not been informed about. He then pushed back on Trump's suggestion that he step aside and call new elections, saying that with all due respect to the US president, it is for Ukrainian society and the Ukrainian people to choose one leader over another. He repeated that he is willing to return to the polls, but only if Russia agrees to a 60-day truce to organize them.
Later on Monday, Zelensky wrote on X that it is increasingly clear Russia is unwilling to accept the US-proposed energy truce and intends to continue what he called terrorist air attacks on Ukraine's population and communities. He argued that further pressure on Russian entities, particularly those involved in producing ballistic missiles and Shahed drones, is the right and necessary signal.
Casualties and blackouts
The missile attack near Kharkiv hit the community of Pisochyn, on the outskirts of the city, striking close to a grocery store and several residential buildings, according to the Ukrainian national police. Three people were killed and 25 were wounded. The dead included a 16-year-old boy, a 19-year-old girl and a 51-year-old woman, authorities said.
Overnight Russian raids on energy infrastructure left parts of Ukraine without electricity. Oleksandr Hanzha, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, said Russia attacked three districts in the region more than ten times with artillery and drones. Residents of Izyum, southeast of Kharkiv, lost power after a strike damaged distribution networks, and the governor of Zhytomyr region reported attacks on railway and energy infrastructure.
The pattern is familiar from previous winters of the war: strikes aimed at the systems that heat homes, pump water and keep hospitals running. Each round forces repair crews to work under threat and leaves civilians to absorb the disruption.
What to watch
Whether Washington can convert its public pressure into an actual halt in strikes on energy targets, and whether Moscow's insistence on a broader settlement rather than a partial pause leaves any room for the narrower deal Trump described.
