In a dramatic escalation of the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, a series of overnight drone strikes on December 11-12, 2025, set ablaze one of Russia’s largest oil refineries and targeted key infrastructure across multiple regions. The Slavneft-YANOS refinery in Yaroslavl, a critical node in Russia’s energy network, became the focal point of a Ukrainian drone campaign that has intensified in recent months, aiming to cripple Moscow’s war funding and logistical capabilities.
According to Caliber.Az and The Kyiv Independent, residents in Yaroslavl—located more than 700 kilometers from Ukraine’s border—reported hearing between five and seven explosions just after 3 a.m., followed by a bright glow and thick columns of smoke rising from the area of the refinery. Social media posts and videos quickly circulated, capturing the dramatic scene as flames swept across the facility. Yaroslavl governor Mikhail Yevrayev had issued a drone threat warning earlier that night, underscoring the mounting anxiety in the region.
The Slavneft-YANOS refinery, part of the Slavneft conglomerate, ranks among Russia’s top five oil-processing plants, with an annual capacity to process up to 15 million tons of crude. It produces a wide array of petroleum products—including automobile gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, and lubricants—that supply major industrial enterprises, regional airports, railway administrations, and defense-related facilities across the Central and Northwestern oblasts of Russia. As reported by Militarnyi, the refinery’s strategic output is deeply intertwined with Russia’s military-industrial complex, making it a high-value target for Ukrainian forces.
Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed the strike in an official Telegram post, stating, “The Defense Forces of Ukraine struck facilities at the Slavneft-YANOS oil refinery in Russia’s Yaroslavl region. This is one of the largest refineries of the occupiers, which is capable of processing from 15 million tons of oil and oil condensate per year. It is involved in providing the armed forces of the Russian invaders.” Footage and open-source intelligence (OSINT) suggest the AVT-4 primary oil distillation unit was likely hit, while the VT-6 vacuum distillation unit had recently been disabled for modernization.
This attack marks the second reported strike on the Yaroslavl refinery in recent months; a similar incident in October 2025 also resulted in a fire at the facility. The repeated targeting of such infrastructure highlights Ukraine’s evolving strategy—one that combines homegrown long-range drones with precise intelligence to disrupt the economic underpinnings of Russia’s war effort.
The Yaroslavl strike was part of a much broader and more ambitious campaign. In the same overnight operation, Ukraine’s Armed Forces launched close to 300 drones and cruise missiles, striking targets across western and central Russia—a distance spanning nearly 2,000 kilometers, according to Russian and Ukrainian sources cited by Caliber.Az. The attacks focused on five major energy production facilities, all of which caught fire, and targeted four Russian military airfields.
Moscow was not spared. Roughly one-fifth of the drones flew directly toward the Russian capital, lingering over the city for hours and forcing air-defense units into intense overnight operations. Authorities issued rare public warnings, urging residents to seek shelter. All four Moscow airports were shut down, with more than 130 flights canceled, delayed, or diverted, leaving thousands of passengers stranded.
Elsewhere, the city of Tver experienced collateral damage when debris from a downed Ukrainian drone crashed into a residential building. Acting regional governor Vitaly Korolev reported that six adults and one child were hospitalized, while 22 people—including five children—were evacuated to a temporary shelter at a nearby school. Residents, awakened by the explosion, helped neighbors escape as a fire ignited on a lower floor, damaging apartments from the first through the fourth floors.
The impact of these strikes is not limited to Russian soil. In southern Ukraine, Odesa was hit by Russian drone attacks targeting infrastructure and residential buildings, resulting in widespread power and water outages, as reported by Serhiy Lysak, head of the Odesa Military Administration. The ongoing tit-for-tat strikes reflect a grim reality: both sides are increasingly targeting civilian and industrial hotspots in a bid to sap each other’s resources and morale.
One of the most significant developments of the night was Ukraine’s first known drone strike on Russian energy infrastructure in the Caspian Sea. According to CNN, Ukrainian sources revealed that long-range drones targeted the Lukoil-operated Filanovsky platform—Russia’s largest offshore oil rig in the Caspian sector. The strike, which ignited a fire and halted production, marked a major escalation in Kyiv’s campaign to disrupt Russia’s energy revenues. “All its enterprises working for the war are legitimate targets,” a Security Service of Ukraine source told CNN.
Ukraine’s deep strikes on Russian energy sites have intensified since August 2025, targeting refineries, export terminals, pipelines, tankers, and now offshore rigs. Vladyslav Vlasiuk, Ukraine’s sanctions commissioner, described the strategy as “long-range sanctions” on Moscow’s financial lifeline. The International Energy Agency (IEA) reported that in November 2025, Russia’s oil export revenues dropped to their lowest monthly level since the February 2022 invasion, totaling $11 billion—a $3.6 billion decline from the previous year. The Russian finance ministry also reported a 22% decrease in oil and gas revenues in the first nine months of 2025, totaling $88 billion.
Sanctions and Ukrainian attacks have also slashed almost half of Russia’s seaborne oil exports through the Black Sea in November 2025, further squeezing the Kremlin’s war chest. The United States, for its part, unveiled harsh new sanctions on Russian oil producers Rosneft and Lukoil in October 2025, in a bid to force Moscow to end the nearly four-year war. The mix of high military spending, entrenched inflation, and lower oil revenues has stretched Russia’s budget, with a projected $50 billion deficit in 2025—about 3% of GDP—and planned tax hikes on consumers and businesses to bridge the gap.
Russian authorities claimed on December 12 that air defenses had shot down between 90 and 95 Ukrainian drones overnight, mostly over the Bryansk region, which borders Ukraine. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported that eight drones were intercepted as they approached the capital. The extent of the damage to the Slavneft-YANOS refinery remains unclear, but the fire and disruption underscore the vulnerability of Russia’s energy infrastructure to sustained, sophisticated attacks.
As the conflict grinds on with no end in sight, these overnight strikes signal a new phase of economic and psychological warfare—one where the battle lines are drawn not just on the front but deep within the heart of each nation’s critical infrastructure.
