By Guy Faulconbridge
MOSCOW (Reuters) – A senior Russian official said on Tuesday that Ukrainian drones had attacked a pipeline in Russia which pumps about 1% of global crude supply, a strike that he said could disrupt flows to world markets and damage U.S. companies.
The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) said on Monday that a crude oil transportation facility, the Kropotkinskaya station in the southern Krasnodar region, was struck by several drones loaded with explosives and shrapnel.
The CPC did not say who was behind the drone attack but said that the Kropotkinskaya facility had been taken out of service and that crude through the Tengiz-Novorossiysk pipeline system was being maintained at reduced flow rates and bypassing the pumping station.
Kropotkinskaya is the largest pumping station on the pipeline in Russia.
“Ukrainian drones attacked a pumping station that provides oil transportation through the main oil pipeline of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium,” Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s powerful Security Council, said.
“A blow to an oil consortium could stop oil pumping, unbalance the market, increase oil price spikes and cause direct damage to American companies,” he said.
An official at Ukraine’s SBU security service said that Kyiv had hit the pumping station and nearby Ilsky oil refinery using drones.
Medvedev said that the attack by Ukraine on a pipeline partly owned by U.S. companies was a blow against U.S. President Donald Trump who has sought lower oil prices and that it remained to be seen what Trump would do about it.
The CPC pumps oil from the vast Tengiz field on the northeastern shores of the Caspian and from Russian producers, taking oil 1,500 km (939 miles) across Kazakhstan and Russia to the Black Sea where it is loaded onto tankers for supply to world markets.
Russia has a 24% stake, Kazakh state oil and gas company KazMunayGas has a 19% stake, Chevron has a 15% stake, Lukoil has a 12.5% stake and Exxon Mobil has a 7.5% stake.
In 2024, CPC exported 63.01 million metric tons of oil, known as the CPC blend.
(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Christopher Cushing)
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