Ukraine struck a Russian oil refinery on Thursday, after President Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv was "done" supporting a ceasefire on energy targets announced by US President Donald Trump. Since Trump's surprise announcement on Sunday that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to halt attacks on energy, Kyiv had suspended attacks on Russian refineries, which Trump blames for raising diesel prices on global markets.
But in the days that followed, Russia launched deadly missile and drone strikes, including on energy targets such as power stations, knocking out power to hundreds of thousands of people. "The block (on attacking refineries) is out. We're done," Zelensky said in an interview with the Financial Times published on Thursday.
The target was a refinery in the Ryazan region southeast of Moscow, owned by state oil major Rosneft, which accounts for nearly 5 per cent of Russia's refinery throughput and helps supply the capital. Regional governor Pavel Malkov said on Telegram that a major Ukrainian drone attack had caused a fire at the refinery. A Ukrainian official said the strike was a response to Moscow's heavy ballistic missile and drone attacks this week, which he said violated the energy truce.
The Kremlin said on Thursday that Ukraine's targeting of Russian energy infrastructure ran counter to US peace efforts. It said earlier this week that the scope of the energy ceasefire had never been determined and work was still ongoing to do so.
RIFT WITH WASHINGTON
By walking away from Trump's demand, Zelensky risks deepening the biggest rift between Kyiv and Washington since the war began in February 2022. Although Trump has described the ceasefire as a requirement for both Moscow and Kyiv, his public comments have focused mainly on Ukraine's attacks on Russian refineries. Last week he lifted sanctions on Russian diesel, and he has called on Ukraine to replace Zelensky.
Asked whether Ukraine would halt energy strikes to repair relations with the White House, Zelensky said he could agree only if given more US-made Patriot interceptors, calling it the "minimum" that would be acceptable. He also said this week's changes to military Starlink receptors, which have curbed Ukraine's ability to use them to pilot its drones, were a policy decision. "It was not a technical problem, it was the will," he said. SpaceX boss Elon Musk wrote overnight that the military version, Starshield, is "owned and controlled by the US government", with any limits "decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS".
OVERNIGHT ATTACKS
In the latest attacks on Ukraine, three people were killed and six wounded in the central Kirovohrad region overnight, as Russia launched more than 500 drones. State-owned energy company Naftogaz said a gas extraction facility in Poltava was damaged and operations were suspended. Ukraine's navy said it had destroyed six Russian Su-34M military aircraft in an overnight strike on the Borisoglebsk airfield in Russia's Voronezh region, using its Neptune coastal missile system.
Trump, under pressure to lower fuel prices, especially for diesel, which has reached record highs since the war with Iran began in February, says the Ukrainian attacks are driving up global prices. — Reuters
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