US President Donald Trump called Ukraine’s fresh wave of strikes on Russian oil refineries a “disgrace” and said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is “more difficult to deal with than [Vladimir] Putin”, in an interview with Newsmax on Thursday, according to the BBC.

Zelensky had paused the attacks for three days at Trump’s request for a ceasefire on energy targets, and said on Thursday the strikes would resume because Moscow had never stopped. The criticism follows the US announcement of a deal to import 300,000 tonnes of Russian diesel to bring fuel prices down, which Zelensky called a gift to Putin.