A fire that halted fuel production over the weekend at Novatek PJSC’s plant in the Baltic Sea port of Ust-Luga was linked by Ukrainian media to Kyiv’s special forces.
The websites of Ukraine’s Suspilne TV and Ukrainska Pravda cited sources in the nation’s Security Service as saying the attack was a special operation of Ukrainian security forces.
Separately, the BBC, citing an official source in Kyiv it didn’t identify, said special forces struck the plant with drones.
The blaze was the result of “external influence,” Novatek said on Sunday, citing preliminary information and without elaborating.
Fontanka, a local media outlet, said drones struck the facility, in the Leningrad region, early local time on Sunday morning, although Russia’s defense ministry reported no attacks in the area.
Russian media report a drone attack on Novatek plant in Leningrad region last night.
Russian media report a drone attack on Novatek plant in Leningrad region last night.
The Novatek plant in Ust-Luga processes stable gas condensate, the final products being oil, kerosene, diesel fraction and fuel oil. The plant is located in the coastal zone, next to a… pic.twitter.com/pUpCoM3ikg
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) January 21, 2024
The incident comes days after Moscow said a Ukrainian drone was downed near St. Petersburg in the Leningrad region, about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) from the border with Ukraine. That was the first known time that a UAV had been spotted in the territory since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine almost 23 months ago.
The Ust-Luga port is one of the country’s two main Baltic Sea energy-export outlets, located about 130 kilometers southwest of St. Petersburg, hometown of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and not far from the Estonian border.
According to Novatek, the Ust-Luga gas condensate-processing plant has ceased all technological operations. There were no casualties.
The complex processes gas condensate into naphtha, jet fuel and gasoil, and ships the petroleum products to overseas markets. In 2022, the facility processed almost 7 million tons of gas condensate, according to Novatek. Condensate is a by-product of natural gas and oil production.
Ukrainian drones have regularly attacked areas in central Russia, including the Moscow region, and areas bordering Ukraine. On Saturday, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that it had intercepted drones in the Smolensk, Tula and Orel regions.