Zelensky Threatens to Respond as Six Energy Sites Are Hit
Six Ukrainian energy facilities were bombed on Monday and thirty-three people injured, the president said, two days after Donald Trump announced an energy ceasefire. “If Russia does not agree to an energy ceasefire this winter, we will respond,” he told a security forum in Warsaw. The Kremlin has still not said whether it agreed to anything.
The ceasefire is now being tested from both ends. Mr Trump told Kyiv to stop striking Russian refineries — “he’d better damn well stop” — and Ukraine agreed not to hit Russian energy; its president is now threatening to resume if Moscow does not stop first. He did not say what form a response would take, and it is worth not assuming refineries. His sharpest line was simpler: “It’s clear that Putin does not read Truth Social.” The grid operator reports new cuts in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia and has introduced electricity rationing to protect damaged equipment; a Kharkiv power station was hit in what was called a targeted attack, and Izyum lost power altogether. No household outage figure exists from any reliable source, so none is given here. Moscow has rejected a proposed sixty-day halt to allow Ukrainian elections, wanting a full settlement first. Kaja Kallas put the European position plainly: “We welcome the energy ceasefire when it holds. We haven’t yet seen that also Russia will stick to it.”