Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has involved himself directly in dealing with fuel shortages in some areas of Russia, caused by Ukraine’s long-range drone attacks on refineries throughout western Russia and its attempt to blockade Crimea. Summing up, in a June 28 interview with journalist Pavel Zarubin for the Sunday prime-time show “Moscow. Kremlin. Putin.” on Rossiya-1 state TV, Putin said there were “certain shortages, although they are not critical.”
During a June 23 government meeting, Putin put Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak, an energy specialist, in charge of the fuel situation, which Novak called “challenging but manageable.” Novak said that the export of airplane fuel has been banned temporarily and a ban on diesel exports is under consideration. The latter is especially important for the agricultural sector as harvest time approaches. A second meeting, held Sunday, June 28 with the same government officials plus the CEOs of major Russian oil and gas companies, confirmed those measures. Putin added that Russia is currently drawing on its petroleum reserves, but they are at almost the same level as this time last year.
Repair times for damaged refineries were discussed, as was tapping into the capacities of smaller refineries. In his interview with Zarubin, Putin also stressed the production and timely delivery of already developed anti-drone defenses for key energy plants that are under attack by “new UAVs [drones] with advanced technologies being supplied from Europe.” He said that there are no fuel shortages for military vehicles at the front in the conflict with Ukraine.
Putin said that Crimea currently has reserves of fuel for several days, “but all demand will be met. We will continue increasing deliveries both overland and by sea.”
In the Sunday meeting as well as his interview, Putin stressed that the damage to Russia’s infrastructure is real, but the strikes also are intended “to fuel … an information operation as part of the broader confrontation with Russia.” In the earlier meeting, he described Kiev as “creating an illusion of a position of strength”, but “in fact, on the ground there is a completely different reality.”
