Ukraine war briefing: Trump sanctions threat on Russian oil buyers could hit China, India (2025)

China and India could be affected if Donald Trump introduces tariffs of 25-50% against countries buying Russian oil, analysts and officials have suggested. Dan Sabbagh reports that the US president told NBC he would impose such measures within a month “if a deal isn’t made, and if I think it was Russia’s fault”, as he vented frustration at Vladimir Putin’s delaying tactics and attempts to discredit Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president.

Some countries, including China and India, are not participating in anti-war sanctions against Russian oil. Secondary sanctions or tariffs imposed directly on them by the US could further limit Putin’s access to oil revenue to fund the war. While not joining the international sanctions against Russia, China has been wary about breaching them in case it attracts secondary penalties. Some Chinese banks, for example, have curtailed dealings with Russian companies for fear of being barred from the international banking system.

UBS analyst Giovanni Staunovo said that targeting buyers – as Trump has done with Venezuela’s oil – could affect China and India. “We need to see, however, what will be announced over the coming days.” India has surpassed China to become the biggest buyer of seaborne Russian crude oil, which comprised about 35% of India’s total crude imports in 2024. There have been concerns since the beginning of the war about India being a “back door” for Russian oil exports.

William Reinsch, a former senior US commerce department official now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the haphazard way Trump was announcing and threatening tariffs left questions unanswered, including how US officials could trace and prove which countries were buying Russian oil.

Trump also claimed on Sunday that Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was “trying to back out of the rare earth deal and if he does that he’s got some problems, big, big problems”. The White House is demanding the first cut of all Ukraine’s mineral resource revenue for years, plus interest, in return for military aid. Zelenskyy has been open to a deal but cautious about the terms, while the Trump administration has been on-again, off-again about getting it signed.

Russia bombed the city of Kharkiv in north-eastern Ukraine for the second night in a row, injuring two people, sparking fires and damaging a kindergarten and private houses, Ukrainian officials said early on Monday. The attacks lasted most of the night, said Kharkiv’s mayor, Ihor Terekhov. Zelenskyy on Sunday said Moscow had fired more than 1,000 drones in the past week and called for a response from the US and other allies.

Russia’s defence ministry claimed on Sunday that its forces had gained control over Zaporizhzhia settlement in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The village is unrelated to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which is in another region. The Russian claim was reported by Reuters, which said it was not able to verify it. The village is 7km from the border of Ukraine’s central Dnipropetrovsk region. The Donetsk region borders Dnipropetrovsk to the east.

Ukraine’s military said on Sunday that it destroyed 65 out of 111 drones launched by Russia during an overnight attack. It added that another 35 drones were “locationally lost” without causing damage – typically a reference to electronic jamming – but damage was reported in the Kharkiv, Sumy, Odesa and Donetsk regions.