Russian President Vladimir Putin made a rare admission, acknowledging the fuel shortage caused by Ukrainian attacks on energy infrastructure. Speaking to senior officials on Sunday, Putin stated, "Unfortunately, there are still queues at gas stations," revealing the gravity of the situation.
Ukraine has intensified its strikes on Russian energy facilities in recent months. These attacks target Russia's crude oil and refined product sales – the main source of funding for the war.
Facilities targeted in the strikes
Norsi, the country's fourth-largest oil refinery and second-largest gasoline producer, halted operations last week following a Ukrainian drone attack. The facility near the city of Kstovo, 450 kilometers east of Moscow, is critical for Russia's domestic market.
The Ukrainian military also struck the Orenburg gas processing plant, which has an annual capacity of 45 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Located 1,200 kilometers behind the front line in the southern Urals, the plant is strategically important for Russia's energy exports.
Last week, two oil facilities in the Crimean city of Kerch and the Kavkaz port, which transports fuel to the front line, were also targeted by long-range drones. Additionally, the Slavyansk and Yaroslavl refineries came under attack. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that these strikes mean "a reduction in the resources serving the Russian war machine."
Experts: "The heart of the refineries is being attacked"
Indra Overland, head of the Center for Energy Research at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), told Al Jazeera that Ukraine is specifically targeting fluid catalytic cracking units at refineries. "These are the heart of the refineries, and they are difficult, expensive, and time-consuming to replace," he said.
Overland noted that Russia is trying to protect these units with scaffolding and nets, but they are ineffective against Ukraine's most powerful domestic weapon, the FP-5. Developed by Ukrainian defense manufacturer Fire Point, the FP-5 has a range of 3,000 kilometers and can carry a warhead of over one ton.
Margarita Zavadskaya, a senior researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA), told Al Jazeera that Ukraine is targeting the "connective tissue" of Russia's geographically vast energy infrastructure. Zavadskaya emphasized that this reveals how poorly this critical infrastructure is protected in the world's largest country by landmass.
Impact on the economy and the public
The crisis is causing unrest among the population. According to Overland, restrictions have been imposed on the sale of gasoline and diesel in most of Russia's regions, with some stations closing or forming queues of up to 12 hours. This is disrupting people's ability to get to work, goods transportation, taxis, and agriculture.
In Russia, the world's largest wheat exporter, the fuel shortage is expected to negatively impact the July-August harvest season, which requires intensive fuel for tractors, water pumps, and other machinery. Additionally, panic buying and hoarding are deepening the crisis; fuel costs, used in the supply of almost every product from food and medicine to construction materials, are fueling inflation.
Markku Kivinen, director of the Aleksanteri Institute at the University of Helsinki, stated that due to the Russian military's priority, military logistics are being preserved, and civilian needs will be ignored if necessary. Kivinen said this affects the government's legitimacy but does not immediately weaken the war effort.
The background to Putin's admission
Experts believe Putin's admission is related to the crisis becoming too visible to deny. Zavadskaya said, "Complete denial would not have been credible and would have further increased the reputational cost of the crisis." However, she noted that Putin is following a typical pattern: "The president maintains control while lower-level officials are held responsible for failures."
Kivinen suggested that by acknowledging the impact of the strikes, Putin may have wanted to link this tension to his own war narrative: "He could justify his own escalation steps by citing the increasing risks to infrastructure."
What's next?
Developments could increase public dissatisfaction in Russia. Zavadskaya noted that repeated strikes are undermining the implicit agreement between citizens and the state: "Citizens pay taxes, accept repression, and tolerate war in exchange for order and basic protection. When refineries burn and fuel becomes scarce, they see that the state cannot fully provide security and stability."
Overland pointed out that the energy crisis could become even more difficult. "It's an interesting question why pipelines, which are thousands of kilometers long and impossible to protect, haven't been attacked more," he said, adding: "Perhaps because they are relatively easy to repair, but Ukraine might be saving that for the autumn heating season."
