Meloni calls US-Russia diesel deal very risky and urges one EU negotiator for Ukraine

The deal and its terms

The United States and Russia agreed in the week before 14 October that Moscow would initially deliver more than 300,000 tonnes of diesel to American and international markets. Libertatea reports that Donald Trump negotiated the arrangement with Vladimir Putin on 9 October and that Washington was set to ease sanctions on Russian fuel. Under the agreement, exports would reach 300,000 tonnes in October and up to 1 million tonnes a month through April 2027. Trump has said Russia would then send 500,000 tonnes in November and another million afterwards. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak confirmed these figures to the state news agency TASS and said volumes could eventually reach three million tonnes a month.

Meloni's objections and EU proposal

Meloni told the Italian parliament on Wednesday, 14 October, that the deal was a very risky choice, ahead of the EU summit scheduled for that week. She put her concern in a single sentence.

The outcome of this decision is uncertain, while the risks are clear.

She argued that the agreement gives Moscow legitimacy while its bombs keep falling on Ukrainian cities, creates new revenue to finance the war and weakens the effect of Western sanctions. She proposed that the 27 EU member states appoint a figure with authority to negotiate for Europe on the war between Russia and Ukraine. She also did not rule out giving a formal mandate to the E3 group of Germany, France and the United Kingdom. HotNews reports that relations between Meloni and Trump had cooled after Trump objected to Rome refusing US use of a Sicilian base for offensive operations against Iran, and after Trump attacked Pope Leo, whom Meloni defended.

Zelensky and Trump's positions

Volodymyr Zelensky criticised the deal, calling it an investment in a war that has to end. In an interview with NPR, he said the Trump administration had warned Kyiv it could suspend the exchange of secret intelligence if Ukrainian forces did not stop long-range drone attacks on Russian oil refineries. Zelensky said Ukraine would keep attacking Russian energy and logistics sites until Russia stopped hitting Ukrainian energy facilities. He also rejected Trump's claim, made in the weekend before 14 October, that Ukraine was responsible for higher diesel prices, blaming the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz instead. Zelensky said he learned of Trump's proposed energy truce from social media. Trump, for his part, said the agreement would help lower energy prices in the United States before the midterm elections on 3 November 2026.

Russia's shrinking export capacity

In an analysis for Meduza summarised by Libertatea, Serghei Vakulenko, principal researcher at the Carnegie Center in Berlin, wrote that Russia supplied about 3% of global diesel consumption and 10% of internationally traded volume in 2025. That placed Russia second worldwide, behind the United States and Saudi Arabia. Ukrainian attacks on refineries and export restrictions introduced in July 2026 sharply reduced the fuel available to foreign buyers. Russian monthly deliveries fell to 300,000 to 350,000 tonnes in September, against 3 million tonnes in April 2026, as domestic demand and limited storage capacity added pressure. Vakulenko considers the deal insufficient to produce a visible drop in US domestic prices before the elections. Libertatea estimates the theoretical value at $7 billion, based on the sale of 5 million tonnes, but says the real benefit for Russia is limited because the diesel would have been exported anyway, on less favourable terms.