Zelenskiy vows more refinery strikes; Russia to step up attacks

Ukraine will double down on attacks on Russian oil refineries, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told Reuters in an interview published on Saturday. Russia answered on Sunday by vowing to intensify its own strikes on Ukraine. Zelenskiy said Ukrainian intelligence had documents showing Putin had issued a ‘new doctrine’ of attacks on a broader range of civilian targets ahead of winter, aiming to force people to abandon cities. ‘They allow them to attack infrastructure, logistics, and especially in the cities and villages,’ Zelenskiy said. Ukraine would hit refineries in response, but not civilians. The Russian Defence Ministry said its forces would step up attacks on military facilities, defence industry sites and related infrastructure in Kyiv and elsewhere. It described recent strikes as retaliation for Ukrainian attacks on Russian targets. Both sides deny deliberately hitting civilians. Russia has recently escalated strikes on Kyiv, including on bridges across the Dnipro river, disrupting life for the capital’s 3 million residents ahead of winter. Zelenskiy also said a Ukrainian counteroffensive, code-named ‘Vivaldi’, had recaptured about 140 square kilometres in the eastern Donbas and was still under way. The Trump administration has in recent weeks sought to revive talks to end the four-year war.
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