Ukraine strikes Tatarstan oil refinery in one of war's deadliest Russia attacks

Ukraine said its drones struck the Taneco refinery in Russia's Tatarstan region, sparking a deadly fire. The attack signalled Kyiv's expanding reach into Russian energy and logistics hubs far from the front.

In Short

• A hostel strike killed foreign workers and a child in Tatarstan
• Officials reported 78 injuries after drones hit industrial and civilian sites
• Ukraine said Tobolsk's petrochemical complex and Tyumen facility were also damaged

Ukraine said it struck an oil refinery in Russia’s Tatarstan region on Monday, in an attack that local authorities said killed 13 people and injured 78 others. The strike on Nizhnekamsk, about 1,200 kilometres east of the Ukrainian border, was one of the deadliest attacks inside Russia since the war began four years ago.

The attack came as Ukraine pressed its campaign against Russian energy and military-linked infrastructure deep inside the country. On the same day, officials also reported a fire at an industrial facility in Russia’s Tyumen region, while Ukraine said it had damaged part of a petrochemical complex in Tobolsk.

Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces had struck the Taneco oil refinery in Nizhnekamsk, causing a fire. Russian officials did not say what the drones had targeted, but Nizhnekamsk has two refineries and a petrochemical plant. Tatarstan head Rustam Minnikhanov’s press service said the city had come under a ‘massive’ drone attack targeting industrial and civilian facilities.

One of the drones hit a hostel, killing nine of the 13 people who died, officials said. The dead included citizens of Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Uzbekistan’s consular office in Tatarstan said seven of its nationals were among those killed. The press service also said a child was among the dead and that 75 people were injured. Monday was declared a day of mourning in Tatarstan.

Also on Monday, several Ukrainian drones caused a fire at an industrial facility in the Tyumen region of western Siberia, Governor Alexander Moor said, without giving details. Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces had damaged part of a petrochemical complex in Tobolsk in the Tyumen region. In a Telegram post, it said the plant produces rocket fuel components, aviation fuel, composite materials for drones and high-octane petrol. Last month, Ukrainian drones hit a refinery in Tyumen, more than 2,400 kilometres east of the border with Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said Kyiv is trying to force Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table and stop Russia’s full-scale invasion, launched in 2022. Late on Sunday, Zelenskyy said on social media: ‘We do deliver entirely justified responses, and every Russian strike will be met with our response. Russia’s war will be felt more and more at their own home –– in Russia.’ He added: ‘The only reason this is still continuing is Russia’s unwillingness to end this war.’

It was not possible to independently verify the claims made by either side. Russia’s Foreign Ministry urged foreign governments and international organisations to condemn Ukraine over the attacks.

Previous Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory with high death tolls were reported in the Belgorod border region. In December 2023, Ukrainian shelling of Belgorod city killed 25 people and injured more than 100, local officials said. Five months later, a residential building in Belgorod partially collapsed after shelling, killing at least 13 people, according to Russian authorities.

Russia has also continued to strike Ukraine with missiles, glide bombs and drones. The United Nations said those attacks have hit civilian areas and caused thousands of civilian casualties. In the first six months of this year, 1,396 civilians were killed and 7,978 injured in Ukraine, the UN office in Kyiv said last week, a 37 per cent rise from the same period last year. On Monday, a Russian glide bomb hit Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine, injuring 24 people, authorities said. The World Health Organisation’s European office also said one of its warehouses in Ukraine’s central Dnipro region was hit twice in less than 24 hours, destroying emergency supplies worth an estimated USD 500,000 meant for front-line health facilities. No casualties were reported.

Ukraine’s domestically developed long-range drones have been reaching deeper into Russia, with some now striking as far as Siberia, around 2,000 kilometres from the border. As part of a parallel effort to disrupt Russian supply lines to the front in eastern and southern Ukraine, Kyiv’s forces struck road, rail and pontoon bridges in six regions last month, Ukraine’s Defence Ministry said on Monday. Ukrainian commanders say repeated attacks on routes used for fuel, ammunition and reinforcements have made Russian logistics slower, more costly and harder to organise, while damage to refinery equipment has made repairs difficult and expensive.

Monday’s strikes underlined Ukraine’s push to hit Russian energy and supply infrastructure far from the front line, even as Russia continued its own aerial attacks on Ukrainian cities and facilities.

With PTI Inputs

- Ends