Ukraine Strikes Oil Depot In Occupied Crimea

Ukraine’s military says it has carried out a strike on a large oil terminal off the coast of the occupied Crimean Peninsula, the latest in a wave of attacks targeting Russian-controlled energy facilities.

Officials in Kyiv said the country’s missile forces launched the strike on the Feodosia terminal – the largest oil processing facility on the peninsula – in an attack overnight.

Russian-installed officials in Crimea have not confirmed the strike but did acknowledge a fire at the facility. No casualties from the blast have been reported.

A municipal-level emergency has been declared, with 300 people being evacuated from Feodosia due to the blaze, the state-run Tass news agency reported.

Footage circulating on social media appeared to show smoke rising over the Feodosia terminal. Local Russian-installed officials told RIA Novosti that efforts to extinguish the fire were ongoing.

Meanwhile, the defence ministry in Moscow said that 12 Ukrainian drones were shot down over the peninsula overnight out of a total of 21 launched by Kyiv.

In a statement announcing the attack, Ukraine’s general staff said that oil products shipped from the terminal were being used to “meet the needs of the Russian occupation army.” Russia illegally annexed the peninsula in 2014.

The facility was previously hit in a Ukrainian drone strike in March.

Kyiv has said that its strikes on Russian-energy facilities are fair retaliation for Moscow’s strikes on its own energy infrastructure, which have frequently plunged millions into darkness.

At least 80% of Ukraine’s thermal power and one-third of its hydroelectric power generation has been destroyed in Russian attacks, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in June.

The Crimea blast comes as officials in Kyiv said the air force shot down 32 drones and two missiles launched towards the Ukrainian capital overnight by Russia.

Air force officials said one Kinzhal missile managed to evade air defences and hit an area around the Starokostiantyniv airfield in the Khmelnytskyi region.

Starokostiantyniv has come under consistent Russian fire over the summer, with Moscow claiming the base houses F-16 fighter jets donated by the West.

Around 65 F-16s have been pledged by Nato countries since US President Joe Biden first authorised willing European allies to send them to Ukraine in August 2023.

The first batch of jets arrived earlier this summer, with fresh deliveries said to have arrived from the Netherlands on Monday.

BBC/Shakirat Sadiq