Ukraine Vows to Keep Striking Russian Refineries Despite Trump Deal – FT

Ukraine vowed to keep attacking Russian oil refineries, even after Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin reportedly agreed on Russian diesel supplies. A senior Ukrainian official said Kyiv would not change its targeting strategy because of US requests to halt strikes. The pledge directly challenges the agreement’s goal of increasing fuel supplies.

The strategy targets the facilities that turn crude oil into usable petroleum products. The article reports that Ukrainian drone operations have damaged distillation units, cracking facilities, and storage hubs. These attacks have helped leave Russian refineries operating at about 60 percent of installed capacity. The official’s statement shows Kyiv views energy infrastructure as a pressure point.

The immediate consequence is uncertainty over whether Russia can fulfill the promised shipments. Analysts say Russia faces a refining problem rather than a crude-oil export problem. With attacks continuing, repairs, equipment shortages, and operating halts could limit diesel availability for Russia, the United States, and international markets.

An oil refinery is an industrial facility that processes crude oil into separate, usable products. These include diesel, gasoline, and other petroleum fuels. Crude oil is a mixture of many hydrocarbons, so refineries use heat, separation, and chemical processing to produce fuels with the needed properties. The article focuses on refineries because diesel cannot simply be shipped from crude oil without this processing.

The key mechanism is capacity. Refineries use units such as primary distillation equipment and cracking facilities to break crude into useful products. The article reports that Ukrainian strikes damaged both kinds of equipment, along with storage hubs. Operational halts, emergency repairs, and equipment deficits then reduced the amount of crude that could become diesel.

This explains why analysts distinguish between crude supply and refining ability. Russia may possess or produce crude, yet still lack enough working equipment to make exportable diesel. The reported result is a refining sector operating at roughly 60 percent of installed capacity, with diesel exports largely halted.

The article reports that Russian refineries were operating at approximately 60 percent of their installed capacity. That figure reflects the effects of operational shutdowns, emergency repairs, equipment shortages, and Ukrainian strikes. It indicates that a large share of Russia’s refining capability was unavailable, even though installed capacity remained higher on paper.

The export comparison shows the scale of the decline. Before 2025, Russia exported an average of 2.6 million metric tons of diesel fuel per month by sea, according to Kpler records. The article links later maritime shipment declines to repeated drone attacks on distillation units, cracking facilities, and storage hubs across European Russia and western Siberia.

By the time described, seaborne diesel exports had effectively ceased except for rare consignments. Russia also introduced strict petroleum-product export restrictions in July to protect domestic supplies and limit inflation. Together, the capacity figure and earlier export average show a sharp contraction in Russia’s downstream fuel trade.

Refineries are the link between crude oil and diesel. Crude is a raw mixture, while diesel is a finished fuel produced through several industrial processes. If those processes stop, stored or newly produced crude cannot be converted into enough diesel for export. This is why the article describes Russia’s central problem as refining, not a lack of crude exports.

Ukrainian strikes reportedly damaged primary distillation units, cracking facilities, and storage hubs. Distillation begins separating crude into components, while cracking helps process heavier parts into useful fuels. When these systems are halted or damaged, output falls. Emergency repairs and equipment deficits can keep units offline even after a strike ends.

The article says Russian refineries were operating at about 60 percent of installed capacity. That reduced operating base helps explain why seaborne diesel exports largely stopped. It also casts doubt on Russia’s ability to meet the diesel quantities announced by Trump, because shipments depend on fuel being refined, stored, and made available for delivery.

Ukrainian drone strikes reduced the amount of diesel Russia could produce by damaging key refinery equipment and storage sites. The article reports that Russian facilities were operating at about 60 percent of installed capacity. That lowered the fuel available for domestic use and foreign shipments, even before Russia imposed its own export controls.

In July, the Kremlin introduced strict restrictions on petroleum-product outflows. The measure effectively prohibited domestic diesel exports, except for rare exceptional consignments, because officials wanted to prevent localized fuel deficits and inflation inside Russia. Before 2025, Russia had exported about 2.6 million metric tons of diesel monthly by sea; later, those shipments effectively ceased.

The international effect was reduced access to Russian diesel, though the United States historically bought very little. Washington had imported none since July 2022. The combination of damaged capacity and export restrictions made promised future deliveries uncertain and added pressure to already volatile international fuel markets.

Donald Trump said Moscow agreed to supply more than 300,000 metric tons of diesel immediately. He also announced 500,000 tons in November and 1 million tons thereafter. Trump said deliveries could eventually reach 3 million tons within a short period, while acknowledging that shipments would depend on the condition of Russian refineries.

That condition matters because diesel is a refined product, not crude oil. Working distillation and cracking equipment must process crude, and storage facilities must hold the finished fuel before shipment. The article reports damage, emergency repairs, operating halts, and equipment shortages across Russia’s refining sector. Analysts therefore questioned where the promised diesel would come from.

The agreement also led the US Treasury to authorize transactions involving Russian diesel through April 7, 2027. Yet Russia’s facilities were reportedly running at only about 60 percent capacity, and seaborne exports had nearly stopped. Continued Ukrainian strikes could make the announced volumes difficult to deliver.

Asymmetric warfare is a strategy in which a weaker side avoids competing with a stronger opponent on equal terms. Instead, it targets vulnerabilities where relatively limited operations can create larger military, economic, or political effects. The article presents Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy infrastructure as an example of this approach.

Refineries are a pressure point because they transform crude into usable fuels and support domestic supplies and exports. Drone strikes can damage distillation units, cracking facilities, and storage hubs. The article reports that these attacks, combined with repairs and equipment shortages, helped reduce Russian refining operations to about 60 percent of installed capacity. They also contributed to the collapse of seaborne diesel exports.

This strategy can raise costs and complicate Russia’s commercial commitments without requiring Ukraine to defeat Russia’s entire energy sector. It also creates political tension with Washington, which urged Kyiv to stop the strikes. Ukraine’s vow to continue shows that Kyiv considers the infrastructure campaign important despite the reported diesel agreement.