A drone attack hit the Ryazan refinery as Kyiv abandoned a short-lived pause on energy strikes and tensions with Washington deepened.
KYIV, UKRAINE — Ukraine resumed attacks on Russian oil refineries Thursday, striking a major facility in the Ryazan region after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv would no longer observe a brief pause on energy targets that Ukraine says Russia failed to honor.
The renewed campaign marks another escalation in the energy dimension of the war and comes during a sharp deterioration in relations between Kyiv and Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump had announced an energy ceasefire and pressed Ukraine to stop striking Russian refineries. Ukraine temporarily suspended those attacks, but Zelenskyy said Russia continued hitting Ukrainian power and energy facilities with missiles and drones. The Ukrainian president said Thursday that the restriction on refinery attacks was over.
The latest Ukrainian target was an oil refinery in Russia’s Ryazan region, southeast of Moscow. The facility is owned by state-controlled oil producer Rosneft and handles nearly 5% of Russia’s refinery throughput, according to Reuters. Ryazan Gov. Pavel Malkov said a large Ukrainian drone attack caused a fire at the refinery. Russia’s Defense Ministry also said the site was attacked. A senior Ukrainian official confirmed to The Associated Press that Ukraine carried out the strike.
The attack followed several days in which Ukraine said it had refrained from hitting Russian energy facilities after Trump announced that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to stop such strikes. Moscow and Kyiv offered differing descriptions of the arrangement. The Kremlin later said the scope of any energy ceasefire had not been settled, while Ukraine said it had observed the pause even as Russian forces continued attacks on its infrastructure.
Zelenskyy told the Financial Times that Ukraine’s patience had run out. “We’re done,” he said while confirming that Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries would resume. Kyiv has increasingly relied on domestically produced long-range drones to attack oil processing plants, storage sites and other targets inside Russia. Ukrainian officials say those operations are intended to reduce resources available for Moscow’s war effort and respond to Russia’s continuing bombardment of Ukraine.
Russia continued large-scale attacks on Ukraine as the refinery strikes resumed. Ukrainian officials said Russian attacks hit nine regions Friday, causing emergency power outages affecting hundreds of thousands of households and damaging homes and other infrastructure. At least 15 people were wounded, according to officials cited by The Associated Press. Russia has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s electricity and heating systems during the war, and Ukrainian officials have warned that another difficult winter lies ahead.
Trump sharply criticized Ukraine’s decision to resume refinery strikes. In an interview with Newsmax aired Thursday, he called the renewed attacks a “disgrace” and argued that strikes on refineries were keeping global energy prices elevated. Trump has repeatedly urged Kyiv to stop attacking Russian oil-processing facilities as his administration seeks a diplomatic agreement to end the war. He also said he found Zelenskyy more difficult to deal with than Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The dispute over refinery attacks is part of a broader strain between the United States and Ukraine. Zelenskyy has complained about disruptions in Western intelligence sharing and restrictions affecting military versions of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite system, which Ukrainian forces use for communications and drone operations. Trump has denied that the United States stopped sharing intelligence. Reuters reported that some limits on the satellite system came from within the White House, citing U.S. and Western officials.
Russia has disputed Ukraine’s account of the pause. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Ukraine never stopped attacking Russian refineries, a claim that could not be independently verified. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also played down the impact of the strikes, saying they had caused nothing especially significant. Ukrainian attacks have nevertheless forced Russia to contend with repeated disruptions at refining and energy sites far from the front lines.
The renewed strikes leave the proposed energy pause effectively broken as fighting intensifies on both sides. Zelenskyy was in Brussels on Friday meeting European leaders and seeking continued military and political support. European officials said they remain committed to Ukraine and urged Washington to keep pressure on Moscow, while no new agreement to halt attacks on Russian or Ukrainian energy infrastructure had been announced.
Author note: Last updated October 16, 2026.