Ukraine hits three Russian oil refineries and sinks sanctioned container ship Yanina in Black Sea

Black Sea container ship sunk

Ukrainian naval drones struck the Yanina, a Russian-flagged container ship owned by Rosatom's shipping subsidiary FESCO, in international waters about 130 nautical miles (240 kilometres) from the port of Novorossiysk during the night of 31 July to 1 August 2026. The ship sank after being hit. Zelensky described it as having a capacity of more than 100,000 tonnes, but ship registries list the Yanina as a small feeder vessel of 9,522 gross tonnes and 13,007 tonnes deadweight, with room for 962 containers. All 17 crew members were forced to abandon the vessel and were rescued, according to Rosatom director general Alexei Likhachev. The vessel was on a voyage from India to Russia, tracking service Marine Traffic showed, with its last reported position south of the illegally occupied Crimean Peninsula.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed the strike, releasing video of the moment of impact. He described the Yanina as a sanctioned vessel supporting Russia's war effort and a legitimate military target.

“Thanks to the precision of our Defense Forces, it was sent to the bottom of the sea.”

Likhachev insisted the ship was carrying purely civilian cargo, including frozen food and construction materials, and accused Ukraine of maritime piracy. The investigative project Agentstvo noted that while the Yanina itself does not appear in international sanctions databases, its owner FESCO is under EU and UK sanctions.

“This was an ordinary civilian container vessel, sailing in international waters and carrying civilian goods – from frozen food to construction and finishing materials. This attack cannot be interpreted as anything other than piracy and maritime robbery.”

Oil refineries hit deep inside Russia

Ukraine's SBU security service said long-range drones struck three oil refineries in Ufa, the capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan: Bashneft-Ufaneftekhim, Bashneft-Novoil and the Ufa refinery Bashneft-UNPZ. The SBU and Zelensky put the distance at nearly 1,600 kilometres from Ukraine; the straight-line distance from the Ukrainian border is closer to 1,300 kilometres. Zelensky said the facilities process millions of tonnes of oil each year and form part of the infrastructure funding Moscow's war. The Russian independent news agency Astra published geolocated footage showing two columns of black smoke rising from a refinery. Damage at all three sites has not been independently confirmed. The head of Bashkortostan, Radiy Khabirov, said the attack on Ufa was repelled and that debris from a downed drone fell in an industrial area, causing smoke but no casualties, and Russia's defence ministry said it had shot down 274 drones overnight across Russian territory, occupied Crimea and the Black and Azov seas. The strikes took place during the same overnight operation as the maritime attack, extending Kyiv's campaign against Russian energy logistics far beyond the front lines.

Power cut at Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported that external power to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant was lost for nearly two hours on Saturday. The plant, which is shut down but requires outside electricity to keep cooling systems running for its nuclear material, has now experienced 23 such outages since Russia's full-scale invasion. The IAEA did not attribute a cause, but the incident highlights the precarious safety situation at Europe's largest nuclear facility.

Russian strikes on Ukrainian ports

Russia's defence ministry said its forces struck fuel storage tanks in the Ukrainian port of Odesa and hit a marine tugboat repurposed for military use in the port of Mykolaiv, Interfax reported. These attacks occurred against the backdrop of intensifying mutual strikes on Black Sea and Sea of Azov shipping, which have pushed global wheat prices higher in recent weeks.

Wider campaign against Black Sea logistics

The sinking of the Yanina is part of a broader Ukrainian strategy that has intensified in recent weeks, targeting Russian tankers and cargo ships that Kyiv says are used to transport sanctioned crude oil and to support military logistics. Russia, which has repeatedly attacked Ukrainian port infrastructure and vessels approaching Ukrainian harbours since its invasion nearly four-and-a-half years ago, condemns such Ukrainian strikes as war crimes. The parallel escalations underscore the Black Sea's role as an active maritime front in the conflict.