Ukraine's General Staff says long-range strikes have disabled over 45% of Russia's designed oil refining capacity, following hits on refineries in Moscow, Ufa, and Samara.
Ukraine's General Staff has reported that a sustained campaign of long-range strikes has disabled over 45% of Russia's designed oil refining capacity. According to the military, one consequence is an acute shortage of high-quality fuel inside Russia and a sharp drop in production of Euro-5/K5 standard gasoline and diesel. Volunteers Support Ukraine notes that this campaign directly undermines Russia's ability to finance its war against Ukraine.
One of the most notable strikes of recent days hit the Moscow Oil Refinery, a facility that supplies around 40% of the Russian capital's fuel market. According to Reuters, the main crude distillation units were hit, and repairs could take several weeks.
On the morning of Sept. 21, drones struck the Bashneft refining complex in Ufa — one of Russia's key oil refining hubs, located more than 1,600 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. Russian authorities declared an alert across the whole of Bashkortostan and temporarily suspended operations at Ufa's airport. The complex comprises three plants with a combined annual capacity exceeding 23 million tonnes of crude oil.
Overnight into Sept. 22, drones struck the Kuibyshev oil refinery in Samara for the second time in recent months — one of the largest facilities in the region, owned by Rosneft. A large fire broke out at the plant, which has already been forced to halt operations multiple times following similar strikes.
These three strikes are just part of a longer campaign that, since August 2025, has already cost Russia's oil refining industry billions of dollars in losses. According to General Staff estimates, the strikes have touched nearly all of Russia's largest refineries, and fuel shortages are now being felt well beyond front-line regions, deep inside the aggressor country.
Volunteers Support Ukraine continues helping people affected by the war in whatever way its available resources allow — and believes that every strike limiting Russia's ability to finance its aggression brings closer the day when this kind of help is no longer needed.
