Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has described US President Donald Trump’s suspension of the so-called Graham Act as a ‘sanctions blackout’ and appealed to Washington to increase pressure on Moscow again. In a post on the short-message service X on Saturday, Zelenskyy wrote that the law had ‘unfortunately been completely ignored’, but could ‘still help a great deal’ – ‘but it really must work, and every vote for it counts’, as the news outlets Європейська правда and Ukrajinska Prawda report. On Friday, 16 October, Trump had suspended by decree the sanctions and tariffs provided for in the law, shortly before they were due to take effect automatically.
Zelenskyy linked his criticism to the latest Russian attacks: in the night before, Russia had carried out one of the largest strikes against Ukrainian energy infrastructure, with more than 15 key electricity generation and transmission facilities in various regions attacked. ‘At the moment when the Russians carried out such a massive strike against our energy, America unfortunately decided to completely ignore Lindsey Graham’s law,’ Ukrajinska Prawda quotes him as saying. Russia was trying ‘to plunge Ukraine into a blackout right before winter and leave millions of people without electricity and heating’.
A law that could still have an effect – or no longer should
The law, named after Senator Lindsey Graham, who died in July, had been passed by Congress in mid-September with a bipartisan majority and signed by Trump himself. Among other things, it provided for tariffs of up to 100 per cent on goods from the five largest buyers of Russian oil and gas – above all China and India – as well as sanctions against senior Russian representatives including President Vladimir Putin, against financial institutions and against the so-called shadow fleet. Under the deadline set in the law, the measures were to take effect automatically 30 days after signing unless the president decided otherwise. It was precisely in this window that Trump suspended them, as the daily newspaper Die Presse and the television broadcaster ZDF report.
The decree published by the White House gives as its justification that the suspension is ‘at this point in time in the national interest of the United States’. The British BBC reports that the move came two days before the planned entry into force and triggered bipartisan criticism among members of Congress. Democratic Congressman Don Beyer of Virginia wrote on X that Trump’s ‘latest capitulation to Putin’ betrayed Ukraine’s partners and ignored the clear will of Congress. Senator Richard Blumenthal, who had worked on the law, also sharply criticised the decision, as Європейська правда reports.
Praise from Moscow, pressure on Ukraine
There was approval from Moscow: Kirill Dmitriev, the Kremlin’s envoy for international economic cooperation, called the suspension an ‘important and truly historic moment’, according to ZDF and Die Presse. The sanctions had above all inflicted ‘serious damage’ on the US economy and the world markets. The move comes at a time of growing tensions between Washington and Kyiv: only a week earlier, Trump had – regardless of existing sanctions – arranged for a delivery of more than 300,000 tonnes of Russian diesel to the US in order to lower fuel prices that had risen as a result of the Iran war – a few weeks before the US midterm elections. Military analyst Colonel Reisner said, according to ZDF, that it was possible Trump was turning away from Ukraine for good. Cologne geopolitics professor Klemens Fischer said on Deutschlandfunk that this was ‘guaranteed the darkest moment for Ukrainians in this war so far’.
For Ukraine, there are concrete consequences: according to its supporters, the law could have noticeably limited revenue from Russian energy exports – money with which Moscow finances its war of aggression. Zelenskyy demanded that no ground be given up: ‘The American sanctions blackout, the easing of pressure on the aggressor, cash bonuses for Putin – all of this only encourages him to strike further.’ The war had to be ended, ‘ended, and Putin must not be given every reason to continue it endlessly’.
He received backing from Brussels: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa assured Ukraine on Friday of further aid and a prospect of EU membership, as Die Presse reports. Zelenskyy asked the EU summit for 70 billion euros for the coming year. According to ZDF, Trump can revoke the suspension at any time – whether and when he will do so is open.
Earlier coverage: Trump suspends Russia sanctions days before deadline
