Page 8 - bneIntelliNews monthly country report Russia May 2024

2.0 Politics
2.1 Drone war: Ukraine hits more targets deep in Russia’s
hinterland
Ukrainian forces struck a drone manufacturing facility in Yelabuga on April 2 and a major oil refinery in Nizhnekamsk, both located in Russia’s Tatarstan over 1,000 km (621 miles) away from the Ukrainian-Russian border.
The attack on the drone factory was carried out by Ukraine’s military intelligence, while the one on the oil refinery was a joint undertaking by the military intelligence and security service. The manufacturing facility in Yelabuga produced Shahed-type attack drones, constantly used by Russian forces to attack Ukraine. While Russian authorities say that no serious damage was caused by the attack, an anonymous source told RBC-Ukraine that there was “significant destruction of production facilities.” Regional authorities denied this, instead underlining that the strike at Yelabuga injured at least 12 international (mostly African) students who worked in the facility.
Following these strikes, U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken commented that the U.S. has “neither supported nor enabled strikes by Ukraine outside of its territory.” Earlier, Washington allegedly warned Kyiv to stop attacking Russian oil refineries out of concern that strikes could lead to an increase in global oil prices. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded that the U.S. cannot limit Ukraine’s deployment of weapons built in Ukraine. “We used our drones. Nobody can say to us you can’t,” said Zelenskyy. The strikes on oil refineries are Ukraine’s response to Russian attacks on critical infrastructure, according to the President. Andrii Yusov, spokesperson for the military intelligence of Ukraine, commented that the weapons used to strike the targets in Yelabuga and Nizhnekamsk were made in Ukraine.
Earlier this week, Ukraine’s Minister of Digital Transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, said that Ukraine can now produce drones capable of flying distances over 1,000 km. Additionally, the country aims to manufacture 1 million drones this year. Despite Ukraine steadily increasing the range of its drone attacks over the past few months, Andrey Gurulyov, a prominent member of the Russian State Duma defence committee, speculated on his Telegram channel that the drones could have been launched from “Central Asia” without naming a specific country. The unsubstantiated claims were spread and amplified on Russian social media and prompted a denial from the government of Kazakhstan.
These repeated Ukrainian drone strikes have caused significant disruptions to Russia’s primary oil refining facilities over the past few months, prompting a fuel export embargo to stabilise the domestic market. Planned and unplanned maintenance work—most recently on Gazprom’s Astrakhan refinery—has further diminished refining capacity. While the Energy Ministry claims that all repairs will be finished by June, the risk of further successful Ukrainian attacks
8 RUSSIA Country Report May 2024 www.intellinews.com