On May 19, a Ukrainian drone slammed into the 70,000-barrel-a-day Slavyansk oil refinery in southern Russia’s Krasnodar region, sending a fireball into the sky, according to videos circulating on social media. It was the third time in two months that Ukrainian forces hit the relatively small plant located several hundred kilometers from the front, dodging Russian air defense systems. The latest strike forced Slavyansk to temporarily shut down until the damage could be repaired.
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enabled_slots.push({ placementName: "oilprice_medrec_atf", slotId: "oilprice_medrec_atf" });';document.write(write_html);} The hits on the refinery were part of a campaign of drone strikes on energy infrastructure inside Russia that Ukraine has carried out in defiance of the United States, which has urged Kyiv not to target such facilities as it defends itself against a full-scale invasion now well into its third year.
The U.S. objections are related to a broader and increasingly heated debate over whether Ukraine should attack targets in Russia, particularly when it is using weapons provided by the West.
Following a spate of successful Ukrainian drone attacks on refineries earlier this year, Artyom Verkhov, a Russian Energy Ministry official, told parliament in March that there were plans to protect some oil and gas infrastructure with missile systems. Meanwhile, companies began taking matters into their own hands amid a reported shortage of air defen.
