While NATO leaders gather in Ankara this week to discuss the Ukraine war among other issues, Kiev and Moscow remain locked in an intense drone campaign targeting each other’s civilian and energy infrastructure.
Recent Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy facilities hit at least 11 major oil refineries, bringing nearly 30 percent of Moscow’s refining capacity to a halt as of June 20 and contributing to worsening fuel shortages across the country.
It’s an unusual development for an energy-rich country, which is the world’s third-largest oil producer, generating about 10.5 million barrels of crude per day.
Growing fuel shortages also forced Moscow, one of the world’s largest sellers of petroleum products, to ban oil and jet fuel exports for months to maintain domestic supply.
Sergei Markov, a Moscow-based political analyst and former adviser to Vladimir Putin, described the Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy facilities as “quite intensive”, saying they have caused power outages in parts of the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula, including Sevastopol, the region’s largest city.
“A lot of people are waiting in lines at many gas stations across Crimea,” Markov tells TRT World.
Around 20 percent of gas stations across the peninsula are out of service, while drivers face unprecedented restrictions on how much gasoline they can purchase each day, he adds.
According to Russian reports, the fuel shortages have also triggered panic buying and the distribution of low-quality gasoline.
In response to the increasing Ukrainian attacks, Russia has intensified its own strikes on Kiev and other cities, reportedly resulting in growing civilian casualties.
The attacks have also exposed vulnerabilities in Ukraine’s air defence system as dwindling stocks of interceptor missiles leave Kiev increasingly vulnerable.
Experts say the recent war on Iran has further strained global supplies of Patriot missiles.
Waiting times for gasoline vary across Russia’s 78 federal subjects, which account for nearly 90 percent of the country’s regions, signalling the expansive nature of the fuel shortages, according to Markov.
Russia is the world’s largest country by landmass, spanning 11 time zones.
“In Moscow it’s 20 minutes, but in other regions it could take hours,” Markov says.
In some areas, Russians wait for more than 18 hours to fill their cars’ tanks, according to emerging reports from the country.
“Of course people are unhappy and quite angry about this waiting process as well as restrictions on the amount of gasoline they can take per day,” he says.
Putin, who has promised victory over Ukraine, has also felt growing Russian resentment over the fuel shortages, uncharacteristically acknowledging the far-reaching scale of the energy disruptions.
“Problems for the motorists, and for the businesses, remain. There are, regrettably, lines at gas stations, and sometimes you can’t find the right brand of gasoline,” he said in a recent speech.
“We also understand the difficulties that agriculture businesses and farmers encounter in the summer season…The harvest depends on this.”
Fuel shortages have not only forced many people to reschedule their summer holiday plans, but have also affected business activity, Markov says.
However, diesel supply, which is crucial for agricultural production as harvest time approaches, is not in very bad shape, he adds.
According to estimates, Ukrainian strikes have forced Russian gasoline production to fall to around 20 percent below domestic demand as refinery operations decline to multi-year lows.
“Such attacks are likely to increase frustration within Russia, especially considering Putin’s objective to insulate the impact of the war in Ukraine for most ordinary Russians,” says Eugene Chausovsky, an expert on Russian politics and senior director for analytical development at the New Lines Institute.
‘Make the Russians feel the war’
Since the start of the war, Ukraine has struck Russian oil refineries more than 300 times, with most of those attacks occurring in 2025 and this year.
In response to fuel shortages, Moscow has sought to shorten repair times at damaged refineries while intensifying its attacks on Ukraine to make Kiev think twice before targeting Russian territory.
