Zelenskiy says Ukraine will keep hitting Russian oil refineries, not civilian targets
He says Ukrainian forces have stabilised the front near Donetsk under an operation he calls Vivaldi, which he says is still underway
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Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, says Ukraine will not strike civilian targets in Russia but will respond to intensified Russian attacks by hitting oil refineries. He says Russia is intensifying strikes on Ukrainian cities because it cannot achieve its battlefield goals.
Zelenskiy says Ukrainian forces have stabilised the situation on the eastern front near Donetsk, under an operation he calls Vivaldi, which he says is still underway and succeeding. He says Russia's hybrid attacks on Europe are meant to divide allies and weaken support for Ukraine.
He says Ukraine depends heavily on its aircraft to shoot down Russian jet-powered drones and needs more 20mm ammunition to keep that defence running through the winter. He says Ukraine's domestically built FP-9 ballistic missile is expected to be ready in autumn, with no earlier substitute in sight.
The refinery pledge formalises a tactic Ukraine has already used repeatedly, including strikes reported overnight on October 2 and recurring attacks since late September. By tying further escalation to the intensity of Russian strikes, Zelenskiy signals the campaign against refineries will continue regardless of talks over Lukoil's assets or any possible Trump-Putin summit, a stance that works against a refinery moratorium proposed by France's Emmanuel Macron. Continued damage to Russian refining capacity keeps pressure on diesel supply out of Russia, a market already showing signs of tightening.