Ukraine hits Russian refinery in record 1,000-mile drone strike

A UKRAINIAN drone yesterday struck a major oil processing plant in Russia’s Bashkiria region from a distance of almost 1,000 miles, a Kyiv intelligence source has said.

The source said the drone’s flight of 932 miles was the longest strike since the start of the war.

Ukraine also hit two oil depots in southern Russia, as Kyiv tries to undermine Vladimir Putin’s forces pressing along front lines on its territory by attacking energy facilities that are crucial to funding the economy and the war.

Russia’s emergency services said a drone attack damaged a pumping station at Gazprom’s Neftekhim Salavat oil, petrochemical and fertiliser complex in Bashkiria, the RIA state news agency reported.

The governor of the region said the plant was functioning as usual despite the drone attack. The nearest government-held part of Ukraine is about 870 miles away.

The Kyiv source told Reuters the drone hit a catalytic cracking unit in an attack that showed “Russian refineries and oil depots serving the military complex cannot feel safe even in the deep rear”.

Moscow says such attacks amount to terrorism and has launched what it says are revenge strikes that have pounded Ukraine’s energy infrastructure since the middle of March, raising fears about the resilience of the Ukrainian power system.

Unable to rapidly match Russia’s vast arsenal of cruise and ballistic missiles, Kyiv has focused on developing and producing long-range drones so it can hit back at Russia, which has bombed Ukraine since Putin’s troops invaded.

The head of the state arms manufacturer said on Wednesday that Ukraine was producing the same number of deep strike drones as Russia, claiming to have reached parity on a key type of weapon Moscow has used for longrange attacks.

The Ukrainian source said Kyiv’s drones also struck two oil depots near the town of Anapa in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region causing large-scale fires overnight. Both attacks were conducted by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).

The depots were used as transshipment points to supply fuel to Russian troops in the nearby occupied peninsula of Crimea, the source added.

Russian authorities said a Ukrainian drone attack caused a fire and damaged several oil tanks at a refinery in Krasnodar region.

About six drones were destroyed, but

‘Refineries and depots serving the military complex cannot feel safe even in the deep rear’

debris fell on a facility near the village of Yurovka, sparking a fire, they wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

“The SBU will continue to reduce Russia’s economic and logistics potential for waging war,” the source said.

Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelensky said yesterday that Ukraine could stop Russian forces advancing in the east if allied countries increased the supply of arms.

The Ukrainian leader made the comments at a joint news conference in Kyiv with Roberta Metsola, the visiting president of the European Parliament, more than two years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion.

Russia has been making small but steady territorial gains in the east of the country since the start of the year, with Ukraine’s forces depleted and weapons and ammunition perilously low.

Russia is said to be working to make strategic breakthroughs before the promised delivery of US aid.

“We are putting maximum pressure on our partners to increase weapon deliveries,” Mr Zelensky said at an openair briefing in the centre of Kyiv.

“If the delivery of weapons is increased, we will be able to stop [Russian forces] in the east, where they have the initiative.”