Ukraine resumes refinery strikes, defying US pressure

Ukraine has resumed attacks on Russian oil refineries after a pause under US pressure. Russian state media said Ukrainian long-range drones set fire overnight to the Kstovo refinery in Nizhny Novgorod oblast, days after a major strike on the Novokuybyshevsk refinery in Samara oblast, owned by the state energy company Rosneft. The Wall Street Journal had reported that Kyiv had accepted White House pressure to stop bombing Russian energy infrastructure, but Ukrainian officials told the Kyiv Independent they never agreed to a demand from Jared Kushner to pause refinery strikes for 30 days, and Kremlin officials said the raids restarted on Friday and complained Kyiv was “simply ignoring” US wishes.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not acknowledged the refinery attacks. He said Ukrainian forces hit a defence industry enterprise in Russia’s Rostov region and destroyed a Pantsir missile system as part of Ukraine’s “long-range sanctions”, and that Kyiv was obliged to retaliate for Russia’s overnight campaign against energy facilities in four Ukrainian regions, which cut electricity in hundreds of thousands of households.