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Ukraine is to restart oil refinery strikes after pausing as drone campaign on Russia's data centres intensifies

A Yandex data centre of the kind struck by Ukrainian forces, three of which were hit between 5 and 11 October, knocking out email and taxi apps for millions of Russians but leaving Kremlin bot networks intact.
A Yandex data centre of the kind struck by Ukrainian forces, three of which were hit between 5 and 11 October, knocking out email and taxi apps for millions of Russians but leaving Kremlin bot networks intact.

President Volodymyr Zelensky has announced Ukraine will resume strikes on Russian oil refineries, ending a three-day pause triggered by fresh Russian attacks and US pressure on Kyiv. The restart comes as Ukraine's drone campaign against Russian digital infrastructure reaches a new scale, with Sberbank's vast Mega Data Center in Balakovo, Saratov region, struck overnight on October 13-14. One woman was killed in Balakovo and several residential buildings were damaged. Russian authorities reported 902 drones destroyed across 19 regions and Crimea in a single night, with 410 flights delayed and 137 cancelled at Moscow airports.

Ukrainian drones have now hit three of Yandex's six largest data centres and Sberbank's flagship facility — all outside Moscow, the only zone with robust air defences.

Sberbank's Balakovo site, built near a nuclear power plant, was set to house Russia's most powerful supercomputer; neither Yandex nor Sberbank has confirmed whether AI hardware was damaged.

Ukraine says its strikes directly mirror Russian attacks on Ukrainian internet infrastructure, with Ukrainian communications remaining operational throughout.

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