Russian strikes on Thursday hit a petrol station in Ukraine's capital and a major sunflower oil plant in the southeastern city of Dnipro, officials said, underscoring a recent intensification of attacks aimed at logistics and civilian economic targets.
In Kyiv, the strike struck an Ukrnafta petrol station and appeared to mark the first time a jet-powered drone targeted such a facility in the capital, according to local authorities. Mayor Vitali Klitschko said four people were injured in the strike. Bohdan Kukura, chief executive of Ukrnafta, posted on Facebook: "There is no military objective in such strikes. This is terror and intimidation of the civilian population." The petrol-station strike follows roughly 300 attacks on petrol stations in or near Ukraine's frontline regions over recent months, authorities said.
In Dnipro, Russian forces hit a sunflower oil processing facility operated by U.S.-owned agribusiness Bunge. Regional officials reported two fatalities and five other people wounded in the attack. The plant is one of Ukraine's five largest food-processing sites, with a stated capacity to process 1,600 tons of oilseeds per day. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha characterized the strike as part of a pattern, saying: "This is no coincidence, but part of Moscow's systematic terror campaign against American businesses and economic interests," in a post on X. He also noted it was the second strike on a U.S.-owned business in recent weeks.
Multiple other regions reported casualties in separate strikes. Regional officials said a Russian attack on Pavlohrad, a key transit hub to frontline areas in eastern Ukraine, killed four people and wounded around 60. In the northeastern city of Sumy, local officials said a jet-powered drone crashed into a shopping centre, coming a day after a similar attack that left two people dead and 20 wounded.
Officials and analysts describe the recent pattern as an escalation of an air campaign that in recent weeks has used ballistic missiles and jet-powered drones to target warehouses, food suppliers and retail chains. Kyiv's ability to repel such attacks has been constrained by a shortage of air-defence systems, according to officials quoted by authorities.
Prime Minister Sergii Koretskyi warned that Russian attacks on businesses and civilian infrastructure were "rapidly growing" and called on the government to "react and act in advance." Russian authorities deny deliberately targeting civilian sites.
Observers note that the strikes are part of a wider exchange of attacks between Moscow and Kyiv that increasingly focus on logistics and other economic targets intended to damage each other's war efforts. The Ukrainian side has targeted Russia's largest online retailers and oil refineries, often deep inside Russian territory, as well as energy and fuel logistics in regions of its own territory occupied by Russian forces. Conversely, Russian strikes have targeted Ukrainian ports and other infrastructure; regional officials reported that attacks on Ukraine's southern port city of Mykolaiv overnight left four people dead and 19 injured.
Context and implications
These incidents reflect a campaign pattern that places fuel supply points, food-processing plants and transit hubs at risk. Damage and disruption to such sites can interrupt domestic fuel availability, constrain food-processing throughput, and complicate the flow of goods to frontline regions. The hit on a major sunflower oil plant with a processing capacity of 1,600 tons per day illustrates the potential for disruption to food supply chains and exportable agricultural commodities; the attack on fuel retail infrastructure highlights vulnerabilities in energy and transportation logistics.
Official casualty figures and statements have been provided by municipal and regional authorities, local company executives and national officials. Where applicable, those sources have described the incidents as deliberate actions against civilian economic targets, a characterization rejected by Russian authorities.