{"id":658872,"date":"2026-10-19T00:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T00:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/658872\/"},"modified":"2026-10-19T00:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T00:22:09","slug":"ukraine-defies-trump-by-launching-its-largest-ever-drone-attack-on-st-petersburg-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/658872\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine defies Trump by launching its largest-ever drone attack on St Petersburg \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ukraine<\/a> carried out its largest-ever drone attack on St Petersburg on Sunday, defying US demands to halt strikes against Russian energy infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Fires broke out at the oil terminal in St Petersburg\u2019s port, governor Alexander Beglov said, sending a large plume of black smoke billowing over the night sky. The attacks indicated Ukraine was determined to press on with its campaign of strikes against Russian refineries, which it had paused after US president Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s surprise announcement that the two countries had agreed to an \u201cenergy ceasefire\u201d. It resumed its campaign after uninterrupted Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. <\/p>\n

Trump said he had agreed the ceasefire, struck a diesel deal with Moscow and waived a set of new sanctions on Russia\u2019s energy exports last Sunday. But the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy<\/a>, said the energy ceasefire failed to stop Russian strikes, with more than 76 recorded attacks on the country\u2019s energy, oil and gas facilities in the past week, leading to large power outages.<\/p>\n

A Russian \u200cair strike killed \u200bone person and injured two \u200bin Ukraine\u2019s \u2060capital Kyiv \u200con Sunday night, the city\u2019s mayor \u200bVitali \u2060Klitschko said \u200bon \u200bTelegram. A \u200bmedical facility \u2060and \u2060a \u200bnon-residential building were damaged in the \u200cattack, \u2060he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe main targets of these strikes are energy facilities \u2013 the Russians are trying to cause a blackout,\u201d Zelenskiy said on X on Sunday. \u201cUnited States should see that Russia is not taking any reciprocal steps in response to sanctions relief or agreements.\u201d<\/p>\n

Air defence forces in St Petersburg claimed to have shot down 146 drones on Sunday. One person was killed and nine injured in the attacks, they added.<\/p>\n

Parts of Russia\u2019s second city lost power for several hours after the drones hit an electricity substation, according to online media outlet Astra. State-run VK, one of Russia\u2019s largest tech companies and parent company of social network VKontakte, said one of its data centres had also been hit. Online marketplace Ozon said a fire broke out after a drone strike on a warehouse in the city, the first time Ukraine had targeted logistics infrastructure since mid-September.<\/p>\n

Airports in Moscow and St Petersburg were closed for several hours during the attack. Hundreds of flights have been cancelled in the past two weeks as Ukraine has expanded its strikes, adding to disruption for Russian travellers who have got used to planning trips considering that they might be severely delayed or land in a different city due to drones. <\/p>\n

Alina, a 33-year-old who lives in the Nevsky district in the southeast of the city, one of the worst affected areas, told the Financial Times that she woke to the sound of explosions at 3am and continued to hear them until 6am. Russia\u2019s defence ministry claimed to have shot down a total of 1,015 drones across the country on Sunday, including 512 in the Moscow area, according to local authorities.<\/p>\n

The dispute over targeting energy infrastructure has seen Kyiv\u2019s relationship with the White House sink further since the infamous Oval Office meeting between Zelenskiy and Trump in February 2025.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Zelenskiy no longer willing to placate TrumpOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

The US, which had previously provided crucial targeting data for the strikes, said it had repeatedly asked Zelenskiy to halt attacks on Russia\u2019s refineries, and then allowed Moscow to export diesel amid a rise in prices on global markets.<\/p>\n

Zelenskiy told NBC\u2019s Meet the Press on Sunday that the US had restored intelligence sharing, which he said had been blocked for three days during ballistic missile attacks on Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Ukraine has accused the US of limiting its military support in favour of abruptly embracing economic deals with Russia even as Russia\u2019s president Vladimir Putin has shown no interest in abating his own aerial onslaught.<\/p>\n

Zelenskiy said several electricity substations were hit in central and southern Ukraine as Russia launched 180 drones, one ballistic missile and several \u201cBanderol\u201d cruise missiles overnight to Sunday. One hundred and fifty-two drones were shot down, according to Ukraine\u2019s air force.<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters on a WhatsApp chat on Saturday, Zelenskiy said he expected the US to lift more sanctions targeting Russia. Trump\u2019s decision to waive sanctions mandated by a law voted by Congress last month \u201conly helps the Russians\u201d, Zelenskiy said.<\/p>\n

In a post on Truth Social on Sunday, Trump said his \u200cdecision to waive sanctions and tariffs \u200brelated to Russian exports is an effort to \u200bkeep Russia at the \u2060negotiating table.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy decision \u2060on \u200bRussia is \u200ba very simple \u200cone,\u201d Trump said \u200bin the post. \u201cI am in \u2060the \u2060process \u200bof negotiating Peace in the war between Russia and Ukraine, and don\u2019t want \u200cto do \u2060anything that will drive, foolishly, Russia away \u200cfrom the bargaining table.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kyiv was blindsided this week by unexplained speed limits on the Starlink communication system used by the military to fly drones used to strike Russian targets behind the front line, as well as to strike drones hitting Ukrainian cities. Zelenskiy said the restrictions were \u201ca planned operation\u201d.<\/p>\n

A senior Ukrainian official told the Financial Times on Sunday that Starlink remained throttled to prevent its use by the Ukrainian military at speeds above 160km\/h. US treasury secretary Scott Bessent told NBC on Sunday that it was \u201creckless\u201d of Zelenskiy to allege that the Trump administration had intentionally slowed Starlink.<\/p>\n

Zelenskiy spoke on Sunday with Trump\u2019s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Kyiv is looking to hold talks next week with the US, though the meeting has not been confirmed yet.<\/p>\n

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026<\/p>\n

Additional reporting: Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukraine carried out its largest-ever drone attack on St Petersburg on Sunday, defying US demands to halt strikes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658873,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[969,42,43,3589,1390,40,38,41,39,9688,5936,58419],"class_list":["post-658872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-donald-trump","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-russia","tag-starlink","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-ukraine-crisis","tag-vladimir-putin","tag-volodymyr-zelenskiy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}