Ukraine strikes Transneft oil hub in Perm, deepens long-range campaign on Russian energy infrastructure

Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) struck Transneft's oil pumping and distribution facility in the city of Perm on April 30, a target 1,600 km from the Ukrainian border, as part of an intensified long-range campaign that has reduced Russian oil export capacity by roughly 40 percent, according to Ukrainian and Reuters estimates.

The SBU described the Perm facility as "a strategically important hub of the main oil transportation system," from which oil was pumped to the Perm refinery and via pipeline in four directions across Russia. Preliminary information suggested that "almost all oil storage tanks are on fire," the SBU said.

Russia's Defence Ministry confirmed the strike and said it had downed 98 Ukrainian UAVs across various regions. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the attacks on oil facilities "terrorist attacks." Russia's presidential envoy to the Urals, Artem Zhoga, wrote on social media: "The Urals are now within reach, be vigilant."

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on April 30 announced "a new stage in the use of Ukrainian weapons to limit the potential of Russia's war." He said Russian internal documents seen by his foreign intelligence service showed that Ukraine had deprived oil offloading ports of much of their capacity: Primorsk on the Baltic Sea lost 13 percent, Ust-Luga lost 43 percent, and the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk lost 38 percent. "We believe that such internal Russian data may be underestimated," Zelenskyy said. He estimated revenue losses of $2.3 billion in March. The internal figures roughly align with a Reuters March estimate that Russia had lost approximately 40 percent of its export capacity.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said Ukraine had likely conducted at least 18 strikes against Russian oil infrastructure in April, with attacks "steadily increasing the range, volume, and intensity" and having "outsized impacts on Russian oil exports."

In the past week, Ukraine struck multiple other targets. On April 23, it damaged three storage tanks at the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod and struck the Novokuibyshevsk petrochemical plant in Samara. On April 24, it destroyed two production facilities at the Atlant-Aero factory in Taganrog, Rostov, which builds Molniya drones used to attack Ukrainian cities. On April 26, Ukraine struck the Yaroslavl oil refinery, and on April 28, it struck the Tuapse oil refinery on the Black Sea for the third time in April. Even before the latest strike, at least 24 oil storage tanks at the Tuapse site had been destroyed, said Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation.

Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said Ukraine devotes 20 percent of its defence resources to new technologies. One of its leading drone manufacturers, Wild Hornets, recently said a drone operator had used its remote piloting system to fly a Sting interceptor drone at a distance of 2,000 km.