A fire erupted at an oil refinery in a region southeast of Moscow following a suspected Ukrainian drone attack in the latest such incident ahead of this weekend’s presidential election in Russia, in which Vladimir Putin is running unopposed and sure to win another six-year term in office.
A drone attacked early on Wednesday an oil refinery in the region of Ryazan, whose main city of the same name is some 120 miles southeast of Moscow, the region’s governor Pavel Malkov wrote on the Telegram channel.
The attack led to a fire and according to preliminary information, people have been injured, Malkov added.
Wednesday’s drone attack is the latest in a series of such incidents since the beginning of the year, and follows several attacks by drones on Tuesday.
A Lukoil refinery in western Russia caught fire after a drone attack early on Tuesday local time in what appears to be several coordinated attacks by drones from Ukraine on Russian refinery and fuel facilities.
A crude processing unit at the refinery in Nizhny Novgorod is on fire after a drone attack was carried out on Tuesday morning, Gleb Nikitin, governor of Nizhny Novgorod, wrote on his Telegram channel.
A few hours earlier, another energy facility in western Russia was also attacked by a drone.
A drone attack was launched at a fuel and energy facility in the Oryol region, governor Andrey Klychkov said on Telegram. One of the fuel tanks caught fire as a result of the attack, a representative of the local authorities told Russian news agency TASS.
Local officials in the capital city Moscow, as well as in the regions of Kursk, Tula, Voronezh, and Belgorod also reported drone attacks, without giving more details.
Lower refining capacity in the second quarter, due to refinery maintenance and emergency repairs following the attacks, could be one of the reasons why Russia said it would focus on cuts to oil production instead of exports in its voluntary supply reduction as part of OPEC+ in the second quarter, analysts say.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
