A Ukrainian drone attack in Crimea on Sunday killed at least four civilians, according to Crimea’s governor, who later announced a halt to gas sales as the peninsula is facing a fuel crisis due to Ukraine’s targeting of its oil supply.
“Unfortunately, there have been civilian casualties as a result of the enemy drone attack on the Kerch Peninsula,” Crimean Governor Sergei Aksyonov wrote on Telegram. “Current information indicates four people have been killed and twenty-eight injured. I express my deepest and most sincere condolences to the families and friends of the victims.”
Ukrainian officials said a drone attack targeted an oil depot in the city of Kerch. In a second post announcing a halt to gas sales, Aksyonov said that fuel “will be sold only to government agencies that ensure the functioning and security of the Republic of Crimea.”
Ukrainian drones also targeted Krasnodar, the Russian Oblast across the Kerch Strait from Crimea, where at least one person was killed in an attack that hit a passenger ferry, bringing the death toll in Ukrainian drone attacks on Sunday to at least five. An oil terminal in Chushka, a Krasnodar village on the Kerch Strait, was also hit, and a fire was reported.
“Facilities on both sides of the Crimean Bridge were hit,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a post on X announcing the attacks. “Maritime logistics used to transport oil in the Krasnodar region and an oil depot in temporarily occupied Kerch. In addition, military logistics facilities were successfully struck, along with four radar stations belonging to S-400 systems and two Pantsir systems.”
The Russian Defense Ministry said that its forces downed nearly 170 Ukrainian drones over the Black Sea, the Azov Sea, Crimea, and several Russian Oblasts. Russia also targeted several Ukrainian regions with missile and drone attacks on Sunday, and a day earlier, Ukrainian officials said that Russian glide bombs killed five people in the city of Zaporizhzhia.
Russian officials had been vowing a significant response to Ukraine’s major June 18 drone attack that hit an oil refinery in Moscow, part of a major swarm that targeted several Russian regions and was one of Ukraine’s biggest attacks on Russian territory of the war.
Ukraine is known to use intelligence from the US and NATO for its long-range drone attacks inside Russia, and the US has helped build up Ukraine’s drone industry, meaning that such attacks always risk a potential escalation between Russia and NATO.
