Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free
Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world
The Trump administration has formally warned Ukraine not to strike targets within Russia that could hit US economic interests, according to Kyiv’s ambassador to Washington.
Olha Stefanishyna on Tuesday said she received a démarche, a diplomatic message intended to register disapproval or complaint, in the wake of Ukraine’s drone strike on the Russian port of Novorossiysk in November.
“We have heard from the Department of State that we should refrain from attacking American interests,” said Stefanishyna, speaking at a press conference to mark the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Kyiv’s attack on the strategically located Black Sea port damaged two tankers that form part of Moscow’s so-called shadow fleet, which it has used to circumvent sanctions on its energy sector.
The strikes also damaged a terminal belonging to Kazakhstan’s Caspian Pipeline Consortium, part owned by Chevron and Exxon.
The port of Novorossiysk is one of Russia’s largest oil export hubs and a strategic outlet for crude shipments from Kazakhstan’s oilfields.
Kyiv has neither confirmed nor denied the attacks on the CPC. Ukraine’s foreign ministry declined to comment. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said striking Russian energy facilities and ports that fund the Kremlin’s war machine are Kyiv’s form of “sanctions”, which he believes will bring Moscow to the negotiating table more quickly.
Stefanishyna added the US warning did not pertain to strikes on Russian military and energy infrastructure.
The state department did not respond to a request for comment about Stefanishyna’s remarks.
The US response to the fourth anniversary of the war has been muted.
The White House did not send a senior US official or delegation to Kyiv to mark Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to a complete list of visiting dignitaries shared with the FT by the Ukrainian presidential administration.
Stefanishyna said Ukraine does not feel abandoned by the US. She said she had been invited to attend Donald Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday evening, during which she expected the US president to speak about ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.
However, earlier on Tuesday at the UN, the US joined 50 other countries in abstaining from a vote on a Kyiv-initiated resolution to support lasting peace in Ukraine. It passed with 107 votes in favour.
Washington’s shift from offering unequivocal political and diplomatic support as well as direct military assistance to a more neutral and Russia-friendly position has irked Kyiv.
Ukrainian officials have privately expressed frustration over the Trump administration’s relative silence about Russian attacks on US businesses in Ukraine. A Russian strike in June badly damaged a Boeing facility in Kyiv.
The American Chamber of Commerce in Kyiv in January reported Russian strikes during the war had damaged 47 per cent of US companies in Ukraine.
Trump in August said he was “not happy” about a Kremlin attack on the plant of American electronics company Flex in western Ukraine. But he has been largely silent on the matter since, despite escalating Russian attacks.
“Russia has been intentionally striking US businesses in Ukraine,” Ukraine’s foreign minister Andriy Sybiha said last week. “While the Kremlin has been proposing a ‘reset’ in economic relations with the United States . . . they simultaneously attacked the Flex Electronics, Boeing and others.”
Sybiha said the attacks “demonstrate that the Kremlin’s seemingly lucrative proposals of economic co-operation are, in fact, nothing more than a ‘Potemkin village’ meant to buy time while dismantling American influence in Europe”.
On Saturday, a Russian missile hit a production facility in eastern Ukraine operated by Mondelez, one of the first big US investors to enter the country after its independence.
Zelenskyy told the FT in an interview on Monday that Trump’s apparent strategy of pressing “both sides” and positioning itself “in the middle” to broker a settlement was deeply frustrating.
Several rounds of peace negotiations including three rounds of trilateral talks between US, Ukrainian and Russian officials have failed to break the impasse that has prevented an end to Europe’s deadliest war since 1945. Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin has maintained his maximalist position, demanding Ukraine hand over more territory, while Zelenskyy has insisted no land can simply be surrendered.