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<\/p>\nBy Dan Peleschuk<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
July 7 (Reuters)\u00a0\u2013\u00a0Ukrainian drones have attacked a dozen tankers from Russia\u2019s \u201cshadow fleet<\/a>\u201d over the past two days that were delivering fuel to Crimea, Kyiv\u2019s military said, as it intensifies efforts to isolate the Russian-occupied peninsula.<\/p>\n In a statement on Tuesday,\u00a0Ukraine\u2019s drone forces said they had struck eight sanctioned vessels in the Sea of Azov each with a deadweight of around 7,000 metric tons. Two more tankers were hit later in the day, they added.<\/p>\n The strikes followed attacks on two other shadow-fleet vessels in the same area a day earlier, according to the drone forces. The Sea of Azov is a key supply route for Russian forces in Crimea and other occupied parts of southern\u00a0Ukraine.<\/p>\n Ukraine\u00a0has stepped up attacks on logistics and energy infrastructure in Crimea in recent weeks, contributing to fuel shortages and prompting authorities to declare a\u00a0state of emergency\u00a0in the peninsula, a critical hub for\u00a0Russia\u2019s war<\/a>\u00a0effort.<\/p>\n Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, eight years before launching its full-scale invasion of\u00a0Ukraine. Moscow has not publicly commented on this week\u2019s attacks, which also included strikes on electrical substations,\u00a0radar systems and missile installations.<\/p>\n COMPLICATING NAVAL LOGISTICS<\/p>\n Ukraine\u2019s drone forces posted drone footage showing vessels being targeted and erupting into flames. Reuters could not independently verify the images.<\/p>\n \u201cStriking the enemy\u2019s naval logistics complicates the supply of fuel and ammunition necessary to support the activities of Russian troops, primarily in the temporarily occupied territory of Crimea,\u201d the forces said in a statement.<\/p>\n Ukraine\u00a0has long urged its allies to crack down on\u00a0vessels that circumvent sanctions\u00a0to transport Russian oil to international markets.<\/p>\n Kyiv has previously used sea drones to target tankers carrying Russian oil in the Black Sea as part of a broader effort to reduce Moscow\u2019s energy revenues.<\/p>\n There have also been a series of unexplained blasts on tankers that had previously called at Russian ports.\u00a0Ukraine\u00a0has neither confirmed nor denied involvement, although maritime security sources have said they suspect Kyiv was behind the incidents.<\/p>\n (Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka and Dan Peleschuk; Additional reporting by Tom Balmforth; Writing by Dan Peleschuk; Editing by Andrew Heavens, Sharon Singleton and Mark Potter)<\/p>\n (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2026.<\/p>\n Editorial Standards<\/a> \u00b7 Corrections<\/a> \u00b7 About gCaptain<\/a><\/p>\n This article contains reporting from Reuters, published under license.<\/p>\n \t\t Sign up for gCaptain\u2019s newsletter and never miss an update<\/p>\n \u2014 trusted by our 104,783 members<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Dan Peleschuk July 7 (Reuters)\u00a0\u2013\u00a0Ukrainian drones have attacked a dozen tankers from Russia\u2019s \u201cshadow fleet\u201d over the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14184,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[25,792,2861,26,319],"class_list":["post-14183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-russia","tag-russian-oil","tag-shadow-fleet","tag-ukraine","tag-ukraine-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14183"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14183\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"logo\"\/](\"https:\/\/gcaptain.com\/wp-content\/themes\/gCaptain-Theme\/assets\/images\/gcaptain-new-gray-logo.svg\"){kind=logo}
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