Russia attacked energy and gas infrastructure in Ukraine early on Friday, the Ukrainian energy minister and national gas firm Naftogaz said.
Naftogaz Group’s gas production infrastructure has come under attack for the seventeenth time, causing damage to critical gas production sites, acting Naftogaz chairman of the board, Roman Chumak, said in a statement on Friday.
No casualties have been reported, but damage has been done to the facilities, the Ukrainian firm said.
“We are working to mitigate the aftermath of the strikes and assess the damage. Naftogaz Group is taking all necessary steps to restore operations at the facilities damaged in the attack,” Chumak said.
“We are doing, and will continue to do, everything possible to ensure the country’s gas supply despite ongoing threats.”
Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko posted on Facebook today that “Energy and gas infrastructure in different regions of Ukraine is again under massive rocket and drone fire.”
Power crews are working to fix whatever possible and Ukraine is taking all necessary measures to stabilize its energy and gas supply, the minister said, accusing Russia of trying to harm ordinary Ukrainians by cutting off power and gas supply.
Friday’s Russian attack on Ukrainian gas infrastructure comes days ahead of planned talks in Saudi Arabia next week between Ukrainian and U.S. officials on possible pathways to ending the war.
In recent months, Russia has intensified attacks on gas production and gas storage infrastructure in Ukraine.
Kyiv, for its part, has been targeting Russian refineries with drones and has damaged several major facilities in southern and southwestern Russia over the past year, some of these multiple times.
Just this week, a fire at the Ufa refinery in the Republic of Bashkiria in Russia was extinguished, local authorities reported, with early reports suggesting the facility may have become the latest target of Ukrainian drone attacks. A later update, however, had authorities report that the fire was caused by technical problems at the facility.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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