Ukraine strikes Ryazan oil refinery in renewed campaign as Russian diesel supply runs thin
Ukrainian drones struck the Ryazan oil refinery overnight, one of Russia's largest, in the fifth refinery attack in a week — deepening Moscow's fuel shortages just as the first Russian diesel cargoes under its deal with the United States head across the Atlantic.
Ukrainian drones struck the Ryazan oil refinery overnight into Thursday, 5 November, setting parts of one of Russia's largest fuel plants on fire and deepening the strain on Moscow's diesel supplies. The attack was the fifth strike on a Russian refinery in seven days, and the second this week, marking the breakdown of a brief pause in the campaign against Russia's oil industry.
The Ryazan plant, owned by the state energy company Rosneft, is one of Russia's three largest refineries. It processes more than 17 million tonnes of crude oil a year and produces petrol, diesel, aviation kerosene, fuel oil and bitumen, supplying fuel to Moscow and central Russia as well as to the Russian armed forces. Footage verified by the independent Russian outlet Astra showed a fire burning at the refinery after the overnight attack.
Ryazan region governor Pavel Malkov said more than 200 Ukrainian drones had attacked the region overnight. He said falling debris caused fires at several industrial sites and damaged power lines, cutting electricity to parts of the city, and that one person was injured. He did not name the facilities that were hit, and neither Rosneft nor the refinery operator has commented. Malkov later said power had been restored and the fires had been extinguished or contained.
Reports from the night also said a large logistics centre belonging to Wildberries, Russia's biggest online retailer, was hit in the same region. The refinery had already been damaged in an earlier attack on 15 October, after which one of its primary crude units was shut down, according to industry sources. It has been struck repeatedly this year, including in May, July and September.
The Ryazan strike follows a rapid sequence of attacks on Russian refining. Drones hit the Novokuybyshevsk refinery in the Samara region on 30 October, the Bashneft-Novoil refinery in Ufa on 31 October and Lukoil's Kstovo plant on 1 November, before striking the Slavneft-YANOS refinery in Yaroslavl overnight on Monday, 3 November. Ukraine's defence intelligence directorate said on Thursday that 15 of Russia's 38 major refineries had been forced to suspend operations by the end of September, with another 12 cutting production, and put the economic damage from strikes on the oil industry at more than $23.2 billion.
Russia's defence ministry said its air defences had shot down 496 Ukrainian drones over 13 regions, Crimea and the Black and Azov seas overnight, a figure that has not been independently verified. Moscow said on Thursday that it had struck a Ukrainian postal logistics hub, a power substation and a cargo ship in return, as the two sides traded drone attacks on each other's infrastructure.
The renewed strikes come at an awkward moment for Moscow's fuel trade. Ukraine's attacks on refineries this year have forced large amounts of processing capacity offline and caused fuel shortages inside Russia, prompting the government to enforce fuel export bans from April onwards. At the same time, Russia has been shipping diesel to international markets under an export deal struck with US President Donald Trump in October, when he was seeking to calm diesel prices ahead of the midterm elections on 3 November, which his Republican Party lost.
At least six Russian diesel cargoes have signalled plans for transatlantic voyages, according to shipping data, and the first observed US-bound Russian shipment is expected to arrive in New York this weekend. No Russian diesel cargo has reached the United States since the deal was struck, and two cargoes appear to have changed course after previously heading for the US Atlantic coast. Regulatory, legislative and sanctions concerns mean the discharge of the first cargo is not guaranteed. Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev said the diesel cargoes destined for the United States were continuing on course, and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said there was no connection between the tankers changing course and the result of the midterm elections.
The strikes are also reshaping the politics around the war. The Democratic Party's sweep of both houses of Congress in the midterms is widely expected to bring more aid for Ukraine and fresh scrutiny of the Trump administration's decisions, including the diesel deal with Russia and the easing of some sanctions. Russian envoy Dmitriev was in Washington on Thursday for the first in-person contact between Russian and US officials since the elections, ahead of three-way talks between US, Russian and Ukrainian officials in Abu Dhabi on 10 November.
For ordinary Russians, the campaign has begun to bite at the pump. Al Jazeera's correspondent in Moscow noted that the strikes had not stopped Russian fuel production, but that shortages were occasionally reported as people rushed to petrol stations to fill up their cars after news of attacks on refineries. With the refinery campaign now running at its fastest pace in weeks and the first American-bound diesel cargoes still to prove they can unload, the coming days will show whether Moscow can keep fuel flowing at home and abroad at the same time.
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