War in Ukraine: Kiev officially proposes an energy truce to Moscow for Easter, announces Volodymyr

Russia stated this week that it had not seen a “clearly formulated initiative” from Kiev regarding a pause in strikes targeting energy infrastructure during the Easter holidays.

Ukraine has transmitted to Russia, through American mediators, a proposal for a truce on strikes targeting energy infrastructure in both countries, said President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday, April 6. “If Russia is ready to stop attacking our energy sector, we are ready to do the same. And this proposal from us – transmitted by the Americans – was communicated to the Russian side,” he said in his evening address.

On Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that Russia had not seen a “clearly formulated initiative” from Kiev regarding an Easter truce in Ukraine. However, he rejected the idea of a ceasefire, stating that the Ukrainian leader must “make appropriate decisions so that we can achieve peace, not a truce.”

On Monday, Moscow accused Ukraine of damaging four reservoirs and an oil pipeline at the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) terminal in Novorossiysk, a Russian port on the Black Sea. Kiev, on the other hand, claimed responsibility for an attack on the port but not on the CPC. In a statement, the Russian Ministry of Defense accused Kiev of trying to cause “destabilization of the global hydrocarbon market and a halt to oil product deliveries to European consumers.” Without mentioning the CPC, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) stated on Monday that they, along with military units, targeted the oil terminal in Cheskharis, also located in the port of Novorossiysk.

This terminal is used to export oil, mainly from Kazakhstan, through the pipeline operated by the CPC, one of the world’s largest that runs from oil fields in Kazakhstan through Russia to the Black Sea. Among the shareholders of the CPC are American oil giants Chevron and ExxonMobil.