Power Plants Struck Hours After the Ceasefire Was Announced
Volodymyr Zelensky says a drone hit a power plant in Kyiv, causing outages in the capital, and that a strike on the CHP-5 plant in Kharkiv followed. “All of this happened after the president of the United States made his statement about an energy ceasefire,” he said. Moscow has not confirmed agreeing to anything.
Donald Trump’s announcement was a social media post: “Effective immediately, there is an ENERGY CEASEFIRE in the War between Russia and Ukraine. Both parties have agreed. Do not break it!” No detail followed, and what Mr Zelensky said next is the story. First that the ceasefire was “news to me”; then that if it had been negotiated with Vladimir Putin, “please tell us when the ceasefire begins. We are ready and we will accept it”; then that “Ukraine is ready not to strike at Russian energy and we count on Russia’s similar readiness.” He counts more than 200 strikes on generation and transmission this week and seventeen hits on gas and oil facilities. Two things are not established and are worth not asserting: the Kremlin has said nothing whatever about having agreed, and Washington has not answered the contradiction. Front pages this morning say Putin broke the ceasefire, but no agreement has been shown to exist. Andy Burnham said Britain “strongly supports” the call; Mark Carney said the parallel diesel arrangement “is in direct opposition to the efforts of Ukraine, Canada and our allies”. Watch for whether Moscow acknowledges the deal at all.