The parts of Russia that once felt too far away to worry about are now on Ukraine's strike map, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said after a meeting with his top military commanders on 26 July. Kyiv will press ahead with its long-range campaign and has updated which sites to hit first, he added. The commanders did not reveal the targets themselves.

Kyiv's commanders sign off on the next phase

Zelenskyy convened Ukraine's military leadership to review the long-range strikes. He left with two decisions—keep the operations going and refresh the priority list. 

Photos the President posted showed new Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Mykhailo Drapatyi, acting Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara and Chief of the General Staff Ihor Skybiuk among those at the table. Kyiv chose the new priorities by one measure: how much each site damages Russia's ability to keep waging the war.

Zelenskyy once again called the effort Ukraine's plan of "long-range sanctions," carried out along set priorities.

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Russia's depth stops being an advantage

Ukrainian strike distances now run past 3,000 km, Zelenskyy noted, saying Kyiv keeps building the range to reach further. For years, Russia's size kept its factories and fuel plants out of harm's way. 

"The strategic depth of the rear, which for a long time was a Russian advantage, is now becoming a particular problem for Russia's political and military leadership," he said. 

Most of Russia's air defense, he noted, sits bunched around Moscow, state residences, the Kerch Strait Bridge and St. Petersburg. Ukrainian drones, he added, have shown they can reach targets in the Urals, in Siberia and in other lands far from the capital.

What Ukraine has hit—and what it still targets

Since the plan began this year, Ukraine has run more than a thousand fire missions, striking oil sites, critical military production and key nodes of Russian logistics, Zelenskyy said. Several parallel deep- and mid-range campaigns run at once. They target:

• oil and fuel sites in Russia and occupied territories
• military factories
• ships in the Azov and Black seas
• the power grid in occupied Crimea
• air defense, logistics and military bases across the occupied areas
• Wildberries, a Russian Amazon-style retailer that also moves non-lethal military gear and drone components

Zelenskyy did not name the specific new targets. Neither has he reiterated all the well-known ones.

The goal is a push toward talks

The point of all this pressure, Zelenskyy said, is to force Russia toward negotiations. He wants the strikes to make weapons components harder to build, pile up oil and economic losses, and, in his words, bring the war back to its "home harbor." Ukraine has handed Russia's leadership everything it needs to end the war on decent terms, he said, and its partners know what that takes. 

"Our precision is working effectively to create conditions for real diplomacy," Zelenskyy said.

Recent long-range hits

Several notable long-range strikes occurred in the days before the meeting. On 24 July, an FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile hit the Avitek military plant in Kirov, about 1,200 km from Ukraine. The next day, drones hit the Tyumen oil refinery some 2,000 km out and set fire to a Wildberries warehouse in Yekaterinburg roughly 1,800 km away.

Ukrainian drones struck oil-industry sites deep inside Russia again overnight on 23 July, setting off fires that burned into the morning, monitoring channels reported. The targets sat far behind the front, and Russian air defenses reported downing drones over more than a dozen regions. Ukraine's military had not claimed the strikes by morning.

Bashkortostan: a pipeline node, not just a refinery

Ukrainian monitoring Telegram channels Exilenova+ and Supernova+ reported a strike on the Subkhankulovo pipeline dispatch station near Tuymazy in Bashkortostan, about 1,300 kilometers from the front. Residents reported roughly eight impacts and a burning storage tank. Long-range Liutyi drones carried out the strike, Supernova+ said. The station belongs to Transneft-Ural and moves crude and fuel between Bashkortostan, Tatarstan, and other Russian regions.

Russian news Telegram channel Astra placed the fire at the station from eyewitness footage. Bashkortostan's emergencies committee later confirmed a fire, blaming falling debris — the explanation Russian officials routinely give for such strikes. A node like this is slower to repair than a single refinery, because it feeds several pipeline routes at once. 

Ukraine burned another Transneft-Ural station in the same republic on 8 July.

Ulyanovsk Oblast: fire at the NS-Oil site

Drones also hit the NS-Oil facility at Novospasskoye, about 800 kilometers from the war zone. Supernova+ published footage of a large fire, and Militarnyi reported drones had struck the refinery. Ulyanovsk governor Alexei Russkikh claimed drones hit a fuel-and-energy site and started a fire.

Monitoring channels differed on the target. Exilenova+ described a liquefied-gas base, while Astra identified the refinery itself. The plant makes gasoline, diesel, and fuel oil. Accounts of its size varied widely, with Astra citing 30,000 tonnes a year and other channels putting it as high as 600,000. 

Ukrainian drones hit the same plant in October last year.

Elsewhere overnight

Drones also reached Voronezh, the capital of a Russian region, bordering Ukraine's occupied northeast, where residents reported explosions. Voronezh governor Alexander Gusev claimed a falling drone set a detached house alight and killed a three-year-old boy, injuring his parents. He said the roof of an online retailer's warehouse was damaged. The company—Wildberries—had already halted night work after earlier strikes.

In occupied Crimea, the monitoring channel Krymsky Veter reported explosions near Feodosia, Yevpatoria, Sevastopol, and Yalta, and said Russian-installed Sevastopol governor Mikhail Razvozhaev claimed a drone attack on the city. Russia's Defense Ministry claimed it downed 223 drones overnight.

Ukrainian drones set fires at two Russian oil facilities at opposite ends of the country overnight on 14 July, according to monitoring channels and Russian regional authorities. The Gazprom Neftekhim Salavat petrochemical complex burned in Bashkortostan, some 1,300 km from the war zone, while the Afipsky refinery caught fire in Krasnodar Krai, around 400 km from the front. A Rosneft oil depot next to the Salavat plant was likely hit as well.

The last big gasoline producer still standing

Residents of Salavat heard a series of explosions in the early hours, then watched thick black smoke climb over the industrial zone, visible across the city. Ukrainian monitoring Telegram channel Exilenova+ published footage of the fires. Russian news Telegram channel Astra confirmed through its OSINT analysis that the Gazprom Neftekhim Salavat complex was struck and burning.

The complex was the last major gasoline producer that strikes had not yet touched in 2026. Its loss means roughly 11,000 tons of daily fuel deliveries gone from the Russian market — about 5% of domestic demand. Drones already struck the plant twice in September 2025, after which the regional head insisted it worked on as normal.

Preliminary damage: primary unit and polyethylene workshop

Ukrainian monitoring channel Supernova+ reported preliminary hits on the AVT-6 primary oil distillation unit and workshop No. 20, which produces high-density polyethylene. Nothing leaves a refinery without primary distillation, so damage there stops the whole production chain.

The strike likely reached beyond the complex itself. The Rosneft-Opt oil depot nearby probably caught fire too, according to Astra.

Bashkortostan head Radiy Khabirov claimed a "massive attack" of drones on Salavat's industrial zone was repelled. He attributed the "pockets of smoke" to falling debris of downed drones and stated nobody was hurt. Russia's aviation authority restricted operations at the Ufa airport during the attack.

Afipsky burns again at the other end of the fuel map

In Krasnodar Krai, the first explosions near the Afipsky refinery sounded around midnight, and a powerful fire followed, Ukrainian monitoring channel Krymsky Veter reported. The blaze rose near the plant's tank farm, according to Astra's analysis of witness footage. The Krasnodar Krai operational headquarters confirmed the fire at the refinery after the drone attack.

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The export-oriented plant runs two primary distillation units with capacities of 9,786 and 8,829 tons per day and does not currently make gasoline or diesel for the domestic market, Reuters reported. Together with the affiliated Krasnodar refinery, it processed 7.2 million tons in 2024 and 3 million tons in the first half of 2025. Ukraine's General Staff puts its share at about 2.1% of Russia's refining.

Long-range Ukrainian drones struck the Ilsky oil refinery in Russia's Krasnodar Krai on July 7, hitting one of the facility's technological workshops, a source in Ukraine's military intelligence (HUR) told the Kyiv Independent.

Located roughly 500 kilometers (311 miles) from Ukrainian-controlled territory, the refinery is among the largest in southern Russia, producing over 6 million tons of fuel annually.

It is involved in the reception, storage, and processing of hydrocarbons and distributes refined products via road and rail. The refinery is part of Russia's military-industrial complex and plays a direct role in supporting Moscow's war effort, the source said.

The Russian regional operational headquarters claimed that "drone debris" fell on the oil refinery.

The strike marks a renewed wave of Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil infrastructure, following a months-long pause since March. On July 1, Ukrainian drones struck the Saratovorgsintez oil refinery in Russia's Saratov Oblast.

Kyiv has targeted dozens of refineries, oil depots, and military-industrial sites since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. Winter drone attacks forced at least four Russian refineries to temporarily shut down.

This is the second known strike on the Ilsky refinery. Ukrainian drones, operated by the Security Service (SBU) and Special Operations Forces (SSO), previously targeted the facility on Feb. 17, causing a fire.

Krasnodar Krai, a strategic region along Russia's Black Sea coast, has increasingly come under Ukrainian drone attacks as Kyiv extends the range of its strikes deep into Russian territory.

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The Kyiv IndependentChris York

Ukrainian drones struck the Saratovorgsintez oil refinery in Russia's Saratov Oblast, causing damage to the facility, Ukraine's General Staff reported on July 1.

"An important facility has been hit," the General Staff said via its official Telegram channel.

The Saratovorgsintez refinery and chemical plant, owned by Russian energy giant Lukoil, is located nearly 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) from Ukraine's border in the city of Saratov. The city hosts multiple strategic military and industrial sites.

The refinery was targeted to "reduce the enemy's offensive capabilities," the General Staff wrote.

"The occupiers use the capacity of this refinery to supply fuel and lubricants to Russian military units involved in the armed aggression against Ukraine."

The attack was a joint operation carried out by Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) and other military units, the General Staff said. A fire broke out at the site of the attack and damage to the refinery's technological installations has been confirmed. The full consequences of the strike are still being investigated.

The Kyiv Independent could not verify these claims.

The report is the latest in a series of announcements on July 1 about successful Ukrainian strikes on Russian targets. Earlier in the day, HUR released footage of Ukraine's UJ-26 drones, commonly known as Bober (Beavers), targeting high-value Russian air defenses and a fighter jet in occupied Crimea.

A source in the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) told the Kyiv Independent that Ukrainian drones struck a major Russian military plant in the city of Izhevsk, over 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) from the front lines.

Ukraine also hit a Russian command post in occupied Donetsk Oblast, according to the General Staff.

Ukraine war latest: Ukrainian drones strike Russian plant 1,300km from border, SBU source says

Key developments on July 1: * ‘With surgical precision’ — Ukrainian drones strike Russian plant 1,300km away, SBU source says * Russian missile strike on Dnipropetrovsk Oblast kills brigade commander, injures 30 people, Zelensky says * Ukrainian forces hit Russian command post in occupied Donetsk Oblast, General Staff says * Zelensky signs ratification of

The Kyiv IndependentThe Kyiv Independent news desk