Ukraine is creating a “long-range impact” command within its armed forces, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a Friday night address to the nation, as Kyiv’s campaign against Russian energy and logistics has forced Moscow to ban diesel exports and restrict shipping near the Sea of Azov. For months, Ukrainian attack drones have been targeting key energy infrastructure thousands of kilometres across Russia in what Kyiv casts as long-range sanctions against the primary contributor to Russia’s state budget. “Today, I signed a decree establishing a special command within the armed forces – a command aimed at a long-range and, in effect, global impact on Russia in response to this war,” Zelenskyy said. “This command must focus 100% of available resources on further reducing Russia’s capacity to wage war.”
Zelenskyy’s address came on a day Ukraine struck the Ilsky oil refinery in the Krasnodar region, one of the largest in Russia’s south, and the Ust-Luga oil refining complex in the Leningrad region, Ukraine’s general staff said. An oil terminal and an oil depot in the Rostov region were also hit, according to the statement. Ukraine’s attacks have also damaged Moscow’s “shadow fleet”, according to Ukraine drone forces commander and one of the masterminds of the long-range campaign, Robert Brovdi. The smaller country has attacked 10 tankers in the Sea of Azov, among almost 50 fuel vessels damaged in the last five days, Brovdi said.
