Ukraine has significantly intensified its attacks against Russia’s energy sector over the past few weeks. On Sunday, Kyiv targeted a gas terminal in the Leningrad region and an oil refinery in Samara.

According to Russian Telegram channels, a large fire broke out at the Novatek gas terminal in the port city of Ust-Luga.

The regional governor of Leningrad, Alexander Drozdenko, claimed that 10 drones were shot down in Ust-Luga, adding that there were no casualties and fuel tanks at a port nearby had not been affected.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Ust-Luga is situated on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland in the Leningrad region, not far from the Estonian border and around 110km west of St Petersburg.

A source in Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) confirmed to The Kyiv Independent news outlet that the SBU was behind the attack on the liquefied natural gas terminal.

Firefighters extinguish a blaze at Russia’s second-largest natural gas producer Novatek in Ust-Luga, 21 January, 2024 – AP Photo

“Russia trades oil and gas through this terminal with the help of a ‘shadow fleet’. Drone sanctions from the SBU reduce the inflow of foreign currency that Russia needs to wage war,” the source said.

The General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces also confirmed that Military Intelligence (HUR), the Unmanned Systems Forces and other defence agencies were behind the strike on the Syzran oil refinery in Samara, which “specialises in the production of gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, and other petroleum supplied to the Russian troops.”

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

“The Syzran refinery has a design capacity of up to 8.5 million tons of crude oil per year, accounting for around 3.08% of Russia’s total oil refining volume,” General Staff wrote on Telegram.

Earlier this month, Ukraine also targeted the Lukoil refinery in Volgograd, the largest in southern Russia, as well as large refineries in the Saratov and Rostov regions.

Kyiv has been focusing its drone attacks on Russia’s refineries, pumping stations and fuel trains in an effort to weaken the Russian war machine.

Firefighters put out a fire following a Russian missile attack on the country’s energy system in Dnipropetrovsk region, 25 December, 2024 – AP Photo

Ukraine’s military intelligence said the Ukrainian Armed Forces are systematically implementing measures aimed at “reducing the combat potential of the Russian occupation forces, destabilising their logistical capabilities, particularly in terms of fuel and lubricant supplies, and forcing Russia to cease its armed aggression against Ukraine.”

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

According to United24, a platform created under the initiative of Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Russian oil refining capacity fell by more than 13% in August following a series of Ukrainian drone strikes on key facilities, leaving several major plants offline.

“When the enemy strikes our energy infrastructure, trying to leave us without light or heat, then its oil refineries burn. And no one can forbid us such strikes because it’s justice itself that delivers them.” he said.

Since the beginning of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, Russia has been targeting Ukraine’s critical energy infrastructure, causing massive power outages across the country, specifically during the winter period, leaving millions of Ukrainians without electricity and heating.

A worker looks on a production hall after a recent Russian missile attack at DTEK’s power plant in Ukraine, 28 November, 2024 – AP Photo

On Monday, Zelenskyy said Moscow had already started its preparations for winter by striking Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

“This applies not only to electricity and heat generation but also our natural gas production,” he explained.

Pressure on Russia’s economy intensifies

Russians are likely to face higher taxes as the burden on the budget grows and the Central Bank of Russia says that “the economy needs a breather”.

Russia’s financial regulator published an order defining nine criteria by which banks may introduce a temporary limit on cash withdrawals from ATMs.

It is noteworthy that the central bank’s order appeared against the backdrop of problems with ATMs, online services and fast payment system due to disruptions with mobile communication and internet in all regions of the country, which have been happening regularly for several months and are accompanied by problems with voice communication and navigation.

A woman stands in a currency exchange office in St. Petersburg, 25 February, 2022 – AP Photo

A fuel crisis is intensifying in Russia and the regions of Ukraine that it has seized amid rising petrol prices.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

According to the latest reports, at least three refineries have completely halted operations. According to various estimates, successful attacks by the AFU have reduced production by 10-15%

According to the Russian-language “Vot Tak” of the Centre for International Broadcasting TVP (Polish Public Television), problems with access to petrol have been observed in several regions in Russia.

In some areas there are huge queues at petrol stations and a system of coupons has been introduced recently. There are also reports in the Russian media that petrol is increasingly being sold only to organisations and businesses.

The Home Cafe Days, or Kodukohvikute paevad in Estonian, are the summer highlight on the island of Hiiumaa. Every August, the residents of Estonia’s second-largest Baltic Sea island open up their homes for three days and offer up home-baked cakes, home-smoked fish and home-brewed beer. They celebrate their short summer amid children’s laughter and pop music.

Ave Ungro, 44, thinks the festival is “extremely important,” especially now in times of war. “It helps us Estonians stick together: Celebrating together, talking, thinking about the future,” she told DW.

She said that Kodukohvikute paevad was as important as the shooting lessons provided by the Women’s Voluntary Defense Organization, or Naiskodukaitse. Ungro has been a member since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Ave Ungro does not want to leave the ‘magical’ island of Hiiumaa Phillip Rabenstein/DW

“Like most Estonians, probably, I was in shock on February 24, 2022. Mainly because of the realization that the life we had known so far could no longer go on in the same way,” she said.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Ungro decided to shape her new life and prepare her family, her island and her country for a possible Russian attack.

Training to defend Estonia

Since then, the speech therapist has spent 48 hours a year training with the Naiskodukaitse and has already completed five different programs: Safety, first aid, military skills, field catering and the history of the Estonian volunteer defense league.

“I did pick up a weapon in the military part,” she said. “But I didn’t shoot once.”

She hopes that she will never have to make use of her military training. If the worst happens, she would prefer to be involved in evacuations.

The Naiskodukaitse was founded in 1927, banned during the Soviet era and reestablished after Estonia regained independence in 1991. It is part of the Kaitseliit, a larger volunteer defense league comprised of well-trained armed civilians intended to support the regular armed forces in times of war. Both units are accountable to the Estonian Defense Ministry.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Ungro said she’s not afraid of a Russian attack. She knows that her island in the Baltic Sea is strategically important, since it lies between the Russian city of St. Petersburg and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad and could potentially be invaded, but she said that despite what certain Western media outlets had reported, there was no feeling of fear.

Estonia invests ‘a great deal in security’

Marek Kohv from the International Center for Defence and Security also doubts that Hiiumaa could become a second Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014. He told DW that Hiiumaa and Estonia in 2025 could not be compared with Crimea and Ukraine in 2014.

He said Estonia might be a small country, but what was important was “that we invest a great deal in security.”

Marek Kohv isn’t worried about a Russian attack on Estonia Phillip Rabenstein/DW

Indeed, Estonia, an EU member, already invests 3.4% of its GDP in defense. This is set to rise to 5.4% by 2029, breaking a record among NATO states.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Kohv explained that Estonia’s culture of self-defense was deeply rooted. “And we have regional allies such as Finland, the new NATO member, but also other Baltic states such as Lithuania and Latvia, as well as Poland, the military superpower in Europe.”

He added that Estonia’s membership of NATO was crucial — thanks to Article 5 and the principle of collective defense, any attack on Estonia would be considered an attack on NATO as a whole, and other armies would be implicated.

He also pointed out that Western military technology was superior to Russian technology. He said the idea that Russia could attack Estonia with nuclear weapons was an empty threat, considering that the proximity of St. Petersburg, which would also be affected by radioactivity in the event of a strike.

Acts of sabotage and GPS jamming

What analysts say is of more acute importance than a theoretical Russian attack on Baltic states are the very real acts of Russian sabotage, such as repeated damage to undersea communication cables or the jamming of GPS signals that can cause aircraft to disappear from the radar.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

This happened to two planes flying from Finland to Estonia in April 2024. Both had to return to Helsinki after their GPS signals were seemingly interfered with.

Ships in the Baltic Sea have also been affected — and these problems are increasing. Western intelligence services suspect the jamming activities to be controlled from nearby Kaliningrad.

Kaliningrad is a ‘dagger pointed at Europe’

Russia has a lot of military equipment stored there, including nuclear-capable Iskander missiles, said political scientist Sergey Sukhankin from the Saratoga Foundation, a US-based nonprofit.

Calling Kaliningrad, where he was born, a “dagger pointed at Europe,” he explained that not only was the enclave located between the EU states of Lithuania and Poland but it was once “a bastion of the Soviet military, one of the most militarized places in the world.” Today, Kaliningrad is regaining that status.

Every year, Hiiumaa residents open their homes to others for three days Phillip Rabenstein/DW

Back at Home Cafe Days, Ungro isn’t thrilled about her regional neighbors and acknowledges how serious the acts of sabotage are, but she would not dream of leaving her “magical” island.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

After the festival, she showed DW her “secret spot” on the coast, a headland surrounded almost entirely by water on all sides.

“Look, a sea eagle,” she called out. “What a beautiful place! So many birds. It’s so quiet here. That’s the beauty of Hiiumaa. And it should stay that way.”

This article was originally written in German.

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Ukraine has stepped up drone attacks on Russian oil refineries and exporting infrastructure, striking the most important sector of President Vladimir Putin’s economy to show it can fight back as the United States seeks to broker a peace deal.

The attacks disrupted Moscow’s oil processing and exports, created gasoline shortages in some parts of Russia and came in response to Moscow’s advances on the front lines and its pounding of Ukraine’s gas and power facilities.

Kyiv’s move is an attempt to raise the stakes in possible peace talks and challenge the idea that Ukraine has already lost the war after U.S. President Donald Trump and Putin met in Alaska this month, analysts have said.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Ukrainian attacks on 10 plants disrupted at least 17% of Russia’s refinery capacity, or 1.1 million barrels per day, according to Reuters calculations.

The drone war has pushed more crude towards exports from the world’s No.2 oil exporter at a time Washington is pressing China and India to reduce purchases of Russian oil.

The refinery hits come as Russia’s seasonal demand for gasoline from tourists and farmers peaks.

Russia had tightened its gasoline export ban in July to deal with a spike in domestic demand even before the attacks.

There were shortages of gasoline in some areas of Russian-controlled Ukraine, southern Russia and even the Far East, forcing motorists to switch to more expensive petrol due to shortages of the regular A-95 grade.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

“We will endure, but this is a big hit to our family budget, a big hit. It’s really noticeable,” said Svetlana Bazhanova, a resident of Sevastopol, the largest city in Crimea which Russia annexed in 2014.

TOURISM DEMAND

Russia’s far eastern port of Vladivostok saw long car queues at gasoline stations, according to a Reuters reporter. The shortages are due to a seasonal influx of tourists, local authorities said.

The affected refineries have lost only part of their capacity but this could still create problems with domestic fuel supplies, said Sergei Vakulenko, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, who previously worked at Russian oil major Gazprom Neft.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Russia relies on oil and gas exports for a quarter of its budget revenues, which are funding a 25% rise in defence spending this year to the highest levels since the Cold War.

Western sanctions have forced Moscow to sell oil at discounts and stop gas sales in most of Europe. This has not deterred Moscow from producing record numbers of artillery and weapons, according to U.S. military generals.

The war in Ukraine has become a battle of attrition with both Russia and Ukraine using drones and missiles to strike far behind the front lines to damage each other’s economies.

So far, Russia’s economy has coped with the sanctions but growth has slowed raising concern in the Kremlin.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

In the past month, Ukraine has attacked Lukoil’s Volgograd, Rosneft’s Ryazan and a host of other plants in the Rostov, Samara, Saratov and Krasnodar regions.

A fire at Russia’s Novoshakhtinsk refinery was still burning on Monday after a Ukrainian drone strike.

Ukrainian drones also attacked the Druzhba pipeline and Novatek’s Ust-Luga export terminal and fuel processing complex on the Baltic.

(Reporting by Reuters in Moscow; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Sharon Singleton)

Russia says a Ukrainian drone attack started a fire at a nuclear power plant in its western Kursk region overnight, as Ukraine celebrated 34 years since its independence.

Russian officials said several power and energy facilities were targeted in the overnight strikes. The fire at the nuclear facility was quickly extinguished with no injuries reported, according to the plant’s press service on Telegram. While the attack damaged a transformer, radiation levels remained within normal ranges.

The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said it was aware of media reports that a transformer at the plants had caught fire “due to military activity,” but hadn’t received independent confirmation. It said its director-general, Rafael Mariano Grossi, said that “every nuclear facility must be protected at all times.”

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Ukraine did not immediately comment on the alleged attack.

Firefighters also responded to a blaze at the port of Ust-Luga in Russia’s Leningrad region, home to a major fuel export terminal. The regional governor said approximately 10 Ukrainian drones were shot down, with debris igniting the fire.

Russia’s Defence Ministry claimed its air defences intercepted 95 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory overnight into Sunday.

Russia, in its turn, fired 72 drones and decoys, along with a cruise missile, into Ukraine overnight into Sunday, Ukraine’s air force said. Of these, 48 drones were shot down or jammed.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

Related

The incidents occurred as Ukraine marked independence day, commemorating its 1991 declaration of independence from the Soviet Union. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivered remarks in a video address from Kyiv’s Independence Square, emphasising the nation’s resolve.

“We are building a Ukraine that will have enough strength and power to live in security and peace,” Zelenskyy said, calling for a “just peace.”

“What our future will be is up to us alone,” he said, in a nod to the US–Russia summit in Alaska earlier in August, which many feared would leave Ukrainian and European interests side-lined.

Advertisement Advertisement

Advertisement Advertisement

“And the world knows this. And the world respects this. It respects Ukraine. It perceives Ukraine as an equal,” he said.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney was among the VIP guests for the occasion and arrived in Kyiv on Sunday morning for meetings with Zelenskyy.

“On this special day — Ukraine’s Independence Day — it is especially important for us to feel the support of our friends. And Canada has always stood by our side,” wrote Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy’s chief of staff.

Norway announced significant new military aid Sunday, pledging about 7 billion kroner (€594 million) for air defence systems. Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said Norway and Germany are jointly funding two Patriot systems, including missiles, with Norway also helping procure air defence radar.

Meanwhile, fighting continued on the front line in eastern Ukraine, where Russia claimed Saturday that its forces had seized two villages in the Donetsk region.

A view shows an oil pump jack outside Almetyevsk, in the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia July 14, 2025. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights , opens new tab

Aug 15 (Reuters) – When U.S. President Donald Trump meets Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, one of his bargaining chips to encourage Putin to make progress toward a ceasefire in Ukraine will be to ease U.S. sanctions on Russia’s energy industry and exports.

Trump has also threatened tougher sanctions if there is no progress.

Sign up here.

Here is how sanctions have impacted Russian energy exports since the start of the conflict.

NATURAL GAS AND LNG

Russia was the top supplier of natural gas to Europe before the war . Most gas travelled through four pipeline routes: Nord Stream running under the Baltic Sea, the Yamal line crossing Poland, transit via Ukraine, and the Turkstream line.

Europe also imports Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG).

In 2021, total Russian gas imports to the EU totalled 150 billion cubic metres (bcm) per year, or 45% of its total imports, and have fallen to 52 bcm or 19% since, according to the European Commission.

While the EU has not imposed sanctions on Russian pipeline gas imports, contract disputes and damage to Nord Stream caused by an explosion, have cut supplies.

As part of a fresh round of sanctions announced in July, the European Union has now banned transactions including any provision of goods or services related to Nord Stream, which albeit damaged could be revived as a gas supply route.

Transit via Ukraine ended at the end of 2024, leaving just Turkstream as a functioning route for Russian pipeline gas to Europe.

The European Commission has also proposed a legally binding ban on EU imports of Russian gas and LNG by the end of 2027, but this has not been passed into legislation yet.

The U.S. in 2024 imposed sanctions on companies supporting the development of Russia’s Arctic LNG 2 project, which would become Russia’s largest plant with an eventual output of 19.8 million metric tons per year.

OIL

The U.S., UK, and EU all prohibited the import of seaborne crude oil and refined petroleum products from Russia during the first year of the war in Ukraine.

In addition to the embargoes, the G7 group of countries (including the US, UK, and EU) imposed a price cap on Russian seaborne crude oil for third countries at $60 per barrel in December 2022, and a cap on fuels the following February.

The EU and UK altered the crude price cap level in June 2025 to $47.60, or 15% below the average market price, but the U.S. did not back the move.

The price cap aims to reduce Russia’s revenues from oil sales by prohibiting shipping, insurance and reinsurance companies from handling tankers carrying crude traded above the cap level.

Western powers have also imposed sanctions on more than 440 tankers belonging to the so-called shadow fleet that transports sanctioned oil outside of Western services and the price cap. Russia’s leading shipper Sovcomflot is also under sanctions in the West.

The measures banning Russian oil imports in the west and restricting Russian oil trade elsewhere have redirected Russian oil flows towards Asia, with China, India, and Turkey emerging as the major buyers for Russian crude.

The price cap was meant to keep Russian oil flowing to prevent a spike in global oil prices which would have followed a halt or severe drop in Russian exports.

Trump has, however, signalled a change in policy in recent weeks by threatening to impose secondary sanctions on India and China for buying Russian oil to put pressure on Putin to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine.

COAL

The European Union banned imports of Russian coal in 2022, seeing volumes drop from 50 million metric tonnes in 2021 to zero by 2023, according to data from Eurostat.

Reporting by Nora Buli in Oslo, Marwa Rashad and Robert Harvey in London; editing by Nina Chestney, Simon Webb and Diane Craft

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. , opens new tab