Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ordered preemptive attacks on facilities Russia is using to support its war effort, as Kyiv expands its drone campaign against Russian energy infrastructure in an effort to pressure Moscow into negotiations.
“I instructed our intelligence services and military to act preemptively against facilities Russia uses to expand its war effort,” Zelenskyy said in an evening address.
The directive comes as Ukrainian drones disrupted power supplies in Sevastopol, the largest city in Russian-annexed Crimea. The Russian-installed governor said trolleybus services had been suspended and advised parents to keep children at home while restoration work continued. Ukraine’s drone forces commander, Robert Brovdi, said drones struck the main substation serving the Sevastopol power plant.
The Moscow oil refinery, the largest fuel supplier to the Russian capital, is expected to remain offline for at least six months after sustaining extensive damage in Ukrainian drone strikes, according to industry sources. The facility was struck twice, forcing it to suspend operations. The attacks have disabled a significant portion of Russia’s oil refining capacity, contributing to fuel shortages, higher prices and long queues at filling stations across the country.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said its air defence systems intercepted 323 drones across multiple regions. In the central Nizhny Novgorod region, falling debris killed two people and damaged an industrial facility. Authorities in the Orenburg region, more than 1,000 kilometres southeast of Moscow, also reported drones being intercepted over an industrial site.
Facing fuel shortages, Russia is considering a ban on diesel exports, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said. The Vedomosti newspaper reported that fuel imports are also being considered to ease shortages, particularly in Crimea, where public gasoline sales have been suspended. Russian lawmakers have approved amendments to the Tax Code allowing lower-quality fuel to be used in gasoline production while delaying some refinery modernisation projects.
Three people were killed in the Russian-held Ukrainian city of Horlivka after the entrance of an apartment building collapsed during a drone attack. In Russia’s Belgorod region, a man was killed and a woman injured in another drone strike, while Russian shelling killed one person in the eastern Ukrainian city of Balakliia.
