Russia reports fire at Volgograd refinery after Ukrainian drone attack
"Firefighters quickly began extinguishing the fire. According to preliminary data, there were no casualties," Andrey Bocharov said on the Telegram.
Lukoil (LKOH.MM), opens new tab, an owner of the refinery, has not yet responded for a Reuters request to comment the attack.
Russia's defence ministry said air defence systems had intercepted and destroyed 44 Ukrainian drones overnight, including nine over Volgograd region.
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The Independent
22 minutes ago
- The Independent
Why is the future of Ukraine's Donbas region becoming a key issue in peace talks?
The future of Ukraine's industrial heartland in the east of the country is uncertain, after Vladimir Putin reportedly demanded it be handed to Russia during his meeting with Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday. Those demands will set a tense backdrop to a potential meeting between Putin and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky. The latter said he was ready for a trilateral meeting with Trump and Putin, after he held a friendly meeting with the US president in the White House on Monday. 'We're going to work with Ukraine. We're going to work with everybody, and we're going to make sure that if there's peace, the peace is going to stay long term. This is very long term,' Trump said after Monday's meeting. But territorial disputes, such as Putin's demands for the Donbas, will pose a major challenge for mediators. The Russian leader demanded that Ukrainian forces withdraw from Donetsk as part of any ceasefire deal, and said he would be prepared to stop fighting on the rest of the frontline if Kyiv gave in to the demand and addressed the 'root causes of the conflict'. The Ukrainian president has said that Putin wants to take the remaining 30 per cent of the eastern region, which has been the location of some of the fiercest battles in the three-and-a-half-year war. But losing Donetsk would give Russia control of almost all of the Donbas, the collective name for Ukraine's eastern industrial heartland, which has been long coveted by Putin. Last week, Zelensky vowed that Ukraine would 'never leave' the Donbas and warned that Putin could use it as a springboard for a future invasion. However, sources close to the meeting told The Independent that the dramatic move appears to have been endorsed by Mr Trump as a means to bring an end to the war. As Kyiv fights to keep the Donbas from Trump's so-called 'land swap' deal, here's all you need to know about the region. Where is the Donbas? Situated along Ukraine's eastern border, the Donbas takes its portmanteau name from 'Donets Basin', a further abbreviation of 'Donets Coal Basin', in reference to the coal basin along the Donets Ridge and River. The Donbas stretches across the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, two large regions of Ukraine that have been on the front line of the war that followed Russia's invasion. How long has it been occupied? The Donbas has been partially occupied by Russia since 2014, around the same time that Putin annexed the Crimean peninsula. Russian-backed separatists broke away from the Ukrainian government to proclaim the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk independent 'people's republics' and, as a result, Moscow captured more than a third of Ukraine's eastern territory. Russia classes inhabitants of the Republic of Crimea, Sevastopol, the Luhansk People's Republic, the Donetsk People's Republic, and the regions of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson as subjects of the Russian Federation. Ukraine insists these territories are part of Ukraine. It is believed that around 88 per cent of the Donbas is under Russian control. This includes almost all of the Luhansk region and 75 per cent of the Donetsk region, according to Reuters. Approximately 6,600 sq km is still controlled by Ukraine, but Russia has been focusing most of its energy along the front in Donetsk, pushing towards the last remaining major cities such as Pokrovsk. A key strategic region in the war The hyper-industrialised Donbas economy is dominated by coal mining and metallurgy. The region has one of the largest coal reserves in Ukraine. When conflict broke out in 2014, Ukraine's coal-mining enterprises saw a 22.4 per cent decline in the production of raw coal compared with 2013, according to the Kyiv Post, showing the country's reliance on Donbas as an energy powerhouse. But as well as its economic significance, Donbas has been described as a 'fortress belt' by the Institute for the Study of War in terms of its strategic value. Donetsk forms the main fortified defensive line across the front line, stretching through Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka, and Kostiantynivka. 'Ukraine is holding a key defensive line across Donetsk,' says Elina Beketova, a fellow at the Centre for European Policy Analysis, describing a 'fortified zone buildup over years because the war began 11 years ago'. She adds that Russia hasn't been able to break through since 2014, and has lost many people there. The entire region is heavily mined, and Ukrainian troops have been preparing it for years. 'It's not just trenches, it's a deep, layered defence with bunkers, anti-tank ditches, minefields, and industrial areas built into the terrain. The area includes dominant heights, rivers, and urban zones that make it extremely hard to capture,' explains Beketova. She says that losing this fortified line would have 'catastrophic consequences' for Ukraine, as it holds back Russia's advancement into central and western parts of the country. 'The front would shift approximately 80km west, and Russia would gain open ground – flat steppe with no natural barriers – giving it a direct path towards Kharkiv, Poltava, and Dnipro.' What Zelensky has said about the Donbas Zelensky has repeatedly rejected calls from Russia to give up the Donbas. In response to Putin's request that Ukraine withdraw from eastern Donetsk, Zelensky vowed that his people would 'never leave' the Donbas, and warned that Putin's troops could use it as a springboard for a future invasion. 'We will not leave Donbas. We cannot do this. Everyone forgets the first part – our territories are illegally occupied. Donbas for the Russians is a springboard for a future new offensive,' he said.
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
We had one chance to sink the Russian economy and we blew it – Putin knew we would
In the weeks following Vladimir Putin 's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Europe 's leaders followed the trail blazed by Boris Johnson to Kyiv to express their undying support for the war effort. Each, in different ways, echoed the Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau's mantra that they would give Ukraine 'as much as it takes, for as long as it takes' to resist Putin. Johnson himself assured Volodymyr Zelensky that 'we are with you, and we are on your side' and vowed that Ukraine's right to 'choose its own destiny is a right that the United Kingdom and our allies will always defend'. Three years later, the successors of those leaders crowded into the White House's Oval Office to applaud Donald Trump's opening of direct talks with Putin. Despite the deaths of hundreds of thousands, and billions in military aid to Kyiv, Putin's forces continue to advance beyond the 20 per cent of Ukraine he now controls. His missiles rain nightly death on Ukraine's cities; Moscow's army launched 270 drones and 10 missiles at central Ukraine just hours after President Zelensky concluded peace talks at the White House. Though Putin's economy is floundering, it is by no means crippled. And while Putin has failed to subjugate the whole of Ukraine to his will, he is on course to accomplish many of his war aims, including the 'liberation' of the Russian-speaking region of the country and blocking Kyiv's membership of Nato. The West carries much of the blame for this failure. Oil and gas are the lifeblood of Russia's war machine – yet from the outset of the war, the US prioritised protecting steady world oil supplies over properly punishing Putin. Europe, too, has imposed 18 rounds of sanctions against Russia – yet itself has continued to find ways to import Russian oil, piped and liquefied gas (LNG), and refined oil products. A large proportion of Russia's oil exports are carried in tankers ultimately owned by EU – especially Greek – shipping companies. And the shocking truth is that over the course of the war, Europeans have paid far more into Kremlin coffers in the form of payments for oil and gas than they have given to defend Ukraine. Europe had one chance to sink the Russian economy and blew it. Since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has pocketed nearly €1 trillion from oil and gas. After China, the EU has been the second biggest buyer of Putin's gas, handing over €260bn. While the EU has repeatedly pledged to reduce its reliance on Russian gas, it has never actually placed any sanctions or price caps on it. Ironically, it was saboteurs rather than European governments that put the biggest dent in Gazprom 's revenues after three of the four Nord Stream undersea gas pipelines were blown up in September 2022. The culprits, according to arrest warrants issued by German police, were Ukrainians. But even after the Nord Stream sabotage, Europe quickly switched to Russian LNG exported from the Baltic terminals of Ust-Luga and Vysotsk. Over three years of war, European leaders have promised Kyiv their support is absolute, or 'your fight is our fight,' in the words of European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen. But rather than cut off Putin's core revenues, the thing that could have really inflicted serious damage, Europeans have chosen legal workarounds. The price of crude oil legally exported by Russia was capped at $60 a barrel – an American strategy to keep oil flowing while squeezing Russian profits. In practice, though, millions of tonnes of Russian crude were fraudulently pumped from one tanker to another with 'clean' paperwork off the coasts of Denmark and Greece. At the same time, Lukoil, Russia's largest private oil company, continues to operate refineries in the Netherlands, Romania and Bulgaria, and can with perfect legality sell its own oil to itself at capped prices, but retail the products at normal market prices. Not wanting to make the crucial economic sacrifice that would accompany any real boycott, other European countries have opted for legal fig-leaves to disguise the true source of their energy. Hungary, Slovakia and other central European countries continue to import oil and gas via Russian pipelines – but it's labelled as coming from Kazakhstan. Amazingly, until 1 January 2025, Russian natural gas kept flowing through Ukraine's pipeline network — set up when Ukraine and Russia were both part of the Soviet Union – to Europe, under a five-year agreement. Russia's state-owned energy giant Gazprom earned money from the gas, and Kyiv collected hundreds of millions in fees for the transit of gas to Europe via pipelines running through Ukrainian territory into Slovakia. Those payments also made Gazprom one of the largest single contributors to Kyiv's state budget. The rest of southern Europe buys billions of piped gas via the Black Sea Turk Stream and Blue Stream pipelines that run from Russia to Turkey, but because it's mixed with gas from Azerbaijan, European customisers can claim they're buying from Baku, not Moscow. Europe now imports more refined Russian oil products than before the war, except that rather than buy directly, much of the petrol, diesel and aviation fuel is refined in India, which has more than doubled its imports of Russian crude and grown rich on the proceeds. Oil and gas are Putin's achilles heel. He needs his economy to survive to keep his war machine running. With the pressure of war, high interest rates and an economic slowdown, another year and he would be in significant problems which would make his negotiating position weaker. But still we cannot sever that vulnerable spot with an arrow because it's our achilles heel too. In Germany, a fateful electoral deal with a now long-departed Green coalition partner led to the closure of the country's nuclear power stations. That left Germany and its neighbours dangerously dependent on cheap Russian gas. Europe's pledges for net zero have also helped rob the continent of the excess energy capacity it would need to 'just say no' to its addiction to Putin's energy. The price for this refusal to countenance economic suffering for the sake of Ukraine has been paid by Ukrainians in blood. When Putin launched his war he was sure that Europe's talk of international law was hypocritical nonsense – not least because he remembered that in the aftermath of his 2014 invasion of Crimea, Germany's chancellor Angela Merkel swore that 'military aggression in Europe cannot go unpunished' and yet little more than a year later signed a €9.5bn deal to build a second Nord Stream pipeline. And though Putin has been undoubtedly surprised by the scale of Europe's military aid to Kyiv, ultimately he has been proved right about the fundamental hypocrisy. 'Ukraine must win this war,' Von Der Leyen boldly told the assembled European elites at the 2022 Davos conference. 'And Putin's aggression must be a strategic failure.' Though Ukraine has not exactly lost the war, it certainly has not won it. And by the same token, while Putin may have failed to dominate Ukraine, he has nonetheless succeeded in snapping up large chunks of it. If a peace deal is struck, it will be on Putin's terms. That outcome could have been very different if the actions of Ukraine's self-declared allies had been as bold as their words.
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Oil flows resume to Hungary, Slovakia via Druzhba pipeline, officials say
Aug 20 (Reuters) - Oil is once again flowing to Hungary and Slovakia via the Druzhba pipeline, officials from both countries said late on Tuesday, after a Ukrainian drone strike on an oil pumping station in Russia's Tambov region halted supplies. Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russia's energy infrastructure, a key conduit for generating money for Kremlin's war efforts, with oil and gas sales accounting for a quarter of Russia's total state budget proceeds. Unlike most other European Union countries, Slovakia and neighbouring Hungary have kept up their dependence on Russian energy and get most of their crude through the Druzhba pipeline. "The flow of oil to Slovakia is currently standard," Slovak Economy Minister Denisa Sakova said in a statement. "In the coming days, we will have clearer information about whether there will be any adjustments to the supply schedule for this month ... However, I believe that given the rapid resumption of flow through the Druzhba pipeline, the impact will be minimal." Oil flows via the Druzhba pipeline to Hungary also resumed, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said in a statement. "I have just thanked Russian Deputy Energy Minister Pavel Sorokin for the swift rectification of the damages caused by the attack," Szijjarto wrote in a Facebook post. Hungarian oil company MOL ( opens new tab said in an emailed statement that fuel production was not disrupted during the temporary shutdown. Oil flows via the Soviet-built Druzhba pipeline were also briefly suspended in March following a Ukrainian attack on a metering station.
