Meloni says Trump's US-Russia diesel deal is a 'very risky choice'

Addressing the Italian parliament on 15 October 2026 ahead of the EU summit in Brussels, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called a new US-Russia agreement under which Moscow would initially supply more than 300,000 metric tons of diesel to the US and global markets a 'very risky choice'. She warned that the deal 'provides Moscow with legitimacy as its bombs continue to fall on Ukrainian cities, generates new revenue to finance the war, and implicitly weakens the effectiveness of sanctions'. Her remarks came after US officials said President Donald Trump had struck the arrangement with Russian President Vladimir Putin because Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ignored half a dozen US requests to stop striking Russian oil refineries. Meloni urged the 27 EU states to appoint 'an authoritative figure' to negotiate for Europe over the Russia-Ukraine war, without ruling out a formal mandate for the E3 group of Germany, France and Britain. Her comments mark a rare public rebuke of a Trump policy from one of his closest European allies and set a confrontational tone for the Brussels talks, where leaders are weighing the use of frozen Russian assets to help Kyiv.