 Zelensky, irritated by US Vice President Kamala Harris' request not to hit Russian oil refineries. US Vice President Kamala Harris met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during the Munich Security Conference in February and urged him to refrain from striking Russian oil refineries. The Washington Post reported this, citing sources. The sources said that Harris' request irritated Zelensky and his aides. The sources noted that the Ukrainian president brushed off these recommendations because he was not sure that they reflected the consensus position of the Joe Biden administration. The newspaper adds that in the following weeks, Washington confirmed this warning in numerous conversations with the Ukrainian side. In particular, these statements were made by senior representatives of the Pentagon and US intelligence, as well as by Jake Sullivan, US National Security Advisor, who visited Kiev in March. However, since then, Ukraine has struck a number of Russian facilities, including an attack on the 2nd of April on Taneco, Russia's third-largest oil refinery located in Tatarstan. US officials say that supporting global energy markets to reduce inflation is a priority for the Biden administration ahead of the presidential election. However, they said it is also important for maintaining European support for Ukraine's war efforts. An increase in energy prices risks dampening European support for Ukraine aid. The US officials said the US also doubts the military benefits of these Ukrainian attacks. In particular, the US military believes that the strikes do little to reduce Russia's combat capability and have led to a large-scale missile attack on Ukraine's power grid, which is much more damaging to Ukraine than the strikes on the refineries were to Russia. The newspaper notes that the US position on strikes on Russian refineries has angered Ukraine, which considers such actions to be justified given Russia's continuous attacks on Ukrainian territory. Ukrainian officials believe that these attacks are necessary to raise the price of Russian aggression and to emphasise that Russian society will not be safe until the war unleashed by Russia ends. Earlier, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently criticised the Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries questioning their impact on the war. Meanwhile, Europe believes that Ukraine has the right to strike Russian refineries.