As the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine enters its third year, Kyiv has ramped up long-range drone and missile attacks deep inside Russian territory, targeting critical energy and industrial infrastructure in a coordinated campaign to erode Moscow’s war funding, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed Thursday. The update came as Britain’s Prince Harry made a surprise third visit to Kyiv in 12 months, using a high-profile appearance to praise Ukraine’s enduring unity and resilience against Russian aggression.
In voice messages shared with reporters Thursday, Zelenskyy stressed that U.S. military aid deliveries have not been disrupted by the outbreak of conflict in the Middle East, despite widespread international concern that shifting global attention could divert weapons support from Ukraine. “Of course, we are hitting what is painful for Russia, and it is very painful,” Zelenskyy said, estimating that Ukrainian strikes have caused tens of billions of dollars in Russian losses to date. While independent verification of Zelenskyy’s claim is not available, Russian officials have previously confirmed that Ukrainian attacks have reached infrastructure more than 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) inside Russia’s borders, matching the Ukrainian leader’s account of deep strikes.
Unlike earlier phases of the war that relied heavily on Western-supplied weapons, Ukraine is now combining Western defense support with domestically developed drone and missile technology to carry out these deep attacks. Ukrainian forces currently use U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems to intercept Russian strikes against Ukraine’s own cities and energy networks, while domestic drone capabilities enable long-range hits on Russian infrastructure. Zelenskyy framed the recent escalation of strikes as a direct response to ongoing Russian attacks on Ukrainian civilian and energy targets: “We see that the Russians do not want to stop — they are hitting our energy sector and our people. We will respond.”
Just hours before Prince Harry arrived in Kyiv, a Russian drone strike on the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro left three civilians dead and 10 more wounded, regional military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha confirmed via the Telegram messaging app. The strike damaged a 13-story residential apartment building and a nearby administrative building, adding to the mounting civilian death toll from months of consistent Russian attacks across Ukrainian territory. On the Russian side of the front line, the Russian Defense Ministry reported that its air defense systems intercepted 154 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions, the Russian-annexed Crimea Peninsula, and the Azov and Black Seas Thursday.
Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, entered Kyiv via an overnight train journey from Poland — the only secure route for civilian travel into the Ukrainian capital — for his third visit to the country in a year. Speaking at a Kyiv security conference, he offered renewed public praise for Ukraine’s resistance against Russia’s much larger invading force. “Ukrainians have demonstrated strength not just in bravery and capability, but in unity, in trust,” Harry said. “Ukraine continues to hold together, and hold together you must.” It remains unclear whether Harry met with Zelenskyy, who was scheduled to travel to Cyprus for a European Union leaders’ summit Thursday evening.
The surge in Ukrainian long-range strikes has focused heavily on Russia’s oil and energy sector, which is the largest single source of revenue for the Russian federal budget that funds its invasion. For the second consecutive night, Ukraine targeted infrastructure in Russia’s Samara region, located roughly 600 miles east of the Ukrainian border. A drone strike on an industrial facility in the Samara city of Novokuybyshevsk killed one civilian, and falling drone debris damaged the roof of a residential building in the regional capital of Samara, wounding multiple people — one of whom was hospitalized, regional governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev confirmed. Unconfirmed media reports identify the targeted facility as a petrochemical plant owned by Russian state oil giant Rosneft.
Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation, confirmed that Ukrainian forces hit multiple key energy sites across Samara and Russia’s Nizhegorodskaya region this week, including a major oil pipeline that carries crude from Western Siberia to Tatarstan. A senior anonymous official from Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) also claimed responsibility for a nighttime drone attack on the Gorky oil pumping station in Nizhny Novgorod region, located east of Moscow. The strike damaged three large oil storage tanks and ignited a massive blaze, the official said, noting that the attack disrupts main oil pipeline operations, reduces refining output, and drives up transportation costs for Russian energy firms — all of which cut into the budget revenues Russia uses to fund its war.
As of Thursday, firefighters in the Black Sea port of Tuapse, Russia were working their third consecutive day to extinguish a large blaze ignited by a Ukrainian drone attack earlier this week. The Krasnodar regional emergency headquarters confirmed that toxic materials from the fire have fallen with rain, covering multiple residential districts in a layer of black soot. Air concentrations of harmful chemicals from the blaze have exceeded legally allowed safety limits, prompting officials to urge local residents to remain indoors to avoid exposure.